


sentimental storm clouds

by majorrager



Category: Bob's Burgers (Cartoon)
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), F/F, First Love, Grey-A, Queer Themes, Romantic Comedy, Summer Camp
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-01
Updated: 2015-06-17
Packaged: 2018-03-15 17:42:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 47,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3456071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/majorrager/pseuds/majorrager
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louise is almost seventeen years old when she breaks away from the restaurant for one summer, landing a job as a camp counselor at the newly inaugurated Thundergirls Summer Camp. She steps out of her comfort zone just as someone else steps right into it— Jessica is just as inscrutable as she remembers, and Louise is already in way over her head.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. i guess they were desperate

**Author's Note:**

> So, this fic is my tribute to Louise, and to my love for Bob's Burgers in general— especially _Slumber Party_ , one of my favorite episodes. [gather the nest](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3642759) functions as a sort of prequel to this, although you don't need to read it to be able to understand this fic.
> 
> Don't expect anything very dramatic or sad or angsty here— this is a story about summer camp and teenage girls falling in love, and, this being Bob's Burgers and Louise being Louise, it's going to come with its fair share of nonsense. Hope you enjoy! Feel free to leave any thoughts or questions you have along the way; I'm always happy to engage with readers.

Louise was 16, going on 17, the summer her parents let her have a job.  
  
A _real_ job, not the one she'd been working since she was 9 in the family restaurant. A job with an hourly wage not determined by the head chef's mood that day, or the constant threat of being grounded by the management. Something with a paycheck she could take to the bank. Getting paid under the table – literally – had been an amusement for a few years, but when that salary was dependent on whether or not she'd brought home good grades, the novelty of her family's maybe-shady business practices had worn off.  
  
"Okay, but this– Bob's Burgers– is not something you're allowed to put on your résumé," her dad had informed her when she mentioned that she would like to give working somewhere else a shot. "Because, you know. Child labor laws, and it'll make me look– I mean the restaurant. It'll make the restaurant look bad."  
  
Her jaw dropped, then she scrunched up her face. "They'll think I have no experience!"  
  
"So... You don't," said Bob faintly.  
  
"But I _do_! Seven _years_ of it!" She swelled up, staring right through him. There had to be a way she could convince her father of the inherent goodness of this idea. She would have to appeal to his sentimentality. Louise considered herself to be an unsentimental person overall, so it would be tough, but she was sure she could find the bloated marshmallow center of her father and convince him to allow her this one thing. "I have been your most _loyal_ employee–"  
  
Bob stared at her. "Loyalty means that you don't try to leave, like... you're doing now."  
  
"–YOUR MOST _LOYAL_ EMPLOYEE," she continued loudly, causing the man seated at the counter to turn and stare at the two of them, "and I have always shown up to work on time–"  
  
"You _live_ here." Bob put a hand to the side of his head, right over one of the patches where his hair was worn thinnest, and turned to the diner, offering him a look that may have been apologetic, or a cry for help– Louise couldn't decide, and right then, she didn't care.  
  
She curled her hands into fists. "You let _Gene_ have a job when he was sixteen. He was getting up at five in the morning every day all summer just to run coffee for a bunch of opinionated old white dudes at the radio station. _Five_ in the _morning_! _Gene_! _Our_ Gene!"  
  
"The problem isn't you having a job," said Bob. "The problem is that you can't use Bob's Burgers as a reference."  
  
"Then how," began Louise, "am I supposed to get a job when they think I've never had one? I'm sixteen. Everyone's had a real job by now."  
  
"You look for other options," said Bob, and he stood up and handed her the newspaper that had been folded up on the stool beneath him.  
  
"Your butt was just on this," she groaned.  
  
"Other options," he repeated.  
  
Louise used only the tips of her fingers to open the newspaper to the classifieds. Her eyes were immediately drawn to a colorful storm cloud cartoon squashed into the corner of the page. Written on top of it were the words, _SEEKING CAMP COUNSELORS, FEMALE, AGES 16-18._ Below that: _$500/week, three weeks._  
  
Sold.

  


•

 

That was how Louise found herself scratching her name in as a counselor for the newly inaugurated Thundergirls Summer Camp. Two days later, she was called for an interview. It took place in the Thundergirls headquarters, located in a section of the town that Louise would normally never have visited for anything under twenty dollars.  
  
She reached the building, surprised to find that it was just a rental space above a record shop. Then again, that kind of fit perfectly from what she remembered about the Thundergirls.  
  
When she entered the office, Louise was immediately delighted to find Ginny sitting there. There was no mistaking her peculiar air of paranoia; she was unmistakably recognizable. The past few years had given her an even more matronly, troop leader-y essence, like she had evolved into a bigger, stronger, cookie sales-ier being.  
  
Louise assured herself that she had this in the bag.  
  
"Ginny!" she shouted in her best approximation of enthusiasm. She knew Ginny, and Ginny knew her. Tina was a legendary Thundergirl whose accomplishments surely had gone down in club history. Nepotism would win this battle.  
  
She received a stare in reply. "I'm sorry?"  
  
Apparently she was not as memorable as she thought. _Oh, shit,_ she thought, lowering her hands from their triumphant pose. She took a seat, contorting her face into a friendly expression. "It's Louise! Uh, you know... Tina's sister? The mole-remover? _Alanis_?"  
  
"Oh," said Ginny. "You." There was a not-very-promising knitting of her brows, and the enthusiasm began to ooze out of Louise entirely. She slumped in her chair.  
  
"Me," she said weakly, reminding herself that she must continue baring her teeth, but in a happy way. A smile! That was it. A smile. She smiled at Ginny. She smiled at the dog sleeping over by one of the cabinets. She smiled down at the placard on Ginny's desk. _CAMP DIRECTOR_ , it said.  
  
"What are your qualifications?" asked Ginny, peering down at Louise's cover letter. It had been stapled to her résumé, which Ginny had only examined for a few seconds.  
  
"Don't really have any," she said brightly, deciding for perhaps the first time in her life that honesty was the best policy.  
  
"Babysitting? First aid? CPR?"  
  
"Maybe, no, and no." Tina and Gene needed a lot of taking care of, but they probably didn't qualify as babysitting experience.  
  
"Can you swim?"  
  
"That one time," said Louise.  
  
Ginny groaned audibly. "There is a preference for long-time Thundergirls for this position. A familiarity with the organization... troop loyalty... It's important to us. Your tenure with the Thundergirls was... Well," she said. Louise waited for her to continue. She didn't. "How is Tina?" she asked, instead of providing a summary of Louise's betrayal of troop 119.  
  
"She's in college studying the vagina prologues and the vulva epilogues," said Louise distractedly. "Please hire me."  
  
There was a long stretch of silence. Louise decided that the humidity in the room had to be about 80% sweat, and most of it was coming from the dog curled up in the corner.  
  
"The term is about three weeks," said Ginny. "That's three weeks away from home– and you'll _always_ be on duty. You need to be with your campers constantly. Are you sure that this is how you want to spend your summer?" As these last words left her mouth, she leaned forward slightly, head inclined, staring down her nose at Louise. The papers clutched in her hands were lowered, as if to allow her eyes to better travel from the top of Louise's ratty pink bunny hat, to the sweater hanging off of her narrow shoulders, to the knee-length black skirt, to her unshaven legs, and then to the bottom of her scuffed-up, dirt-stained boots.  
  
_Am I sure that this is how I want to spend my summer_ , Louise thought to herself, before thinking a resounding _No._ What Ginny was _really_ asking was if Louise would be the right kind of person for the Thundergirls brand. By asking her, she was offering Louise an easy way out of this whole thing. She knew it, Ginny knew it, and even the dog over there probably knew it.  
  
There was no way in hell Louise fit what they were looking for, and fake-it-til-you-make-it could only take her so far. She did not fit the Thundergirls ideal– not in image, and certainly not in personality, and she _definitely_ didn't want to spend three weeks of her precious summer treating bug bites and taking little girls out canoeing. But she needed this job.  
  
Louise reached up to make sure that her septum ring stayed snugly tucked up her nose, and then she pressed her hands to the desk, stood, and leaned forward. "Yes," she said in her firmest, most adult, most treat-me-seriously voice. "I am sure that this is how I want to spend my summer, and I feel like I would be a great fit as–"  
  
"Did you just pick your nose in front of me?"  
  
"No," said Louise maturely, although now she wished she had.  
  
Ginny sighed. She set down Louise's cover letter. "Very well. I'll call you next week when decisions have been made."

  


•

 

It didn't take nearly that long. When Louise hung up the phone three days later, a smug look on her face, everyone knew.  
  
Gene laughed. "I guess they were desperate," he said, before he clapped her on the back triumphantly and sent her knees buckling beneath her.

  


•

  

> _June 7th, 2015_  
>  **RE: Seeking Camp Counselors**
> 
> Camp Director  
>  Thundergirls Summer Camp  
>  P.O. Box #4301  
>  Gold Ridge Lake
> 
> To whom it may concern,  
>    
>  My name is Louise Belcher. I am 16 years old, and I am writing to you in response to the help wanted advertisement that was placed in Monday's edition of the newspaper. I believe myself to be the best possible candidate for a camp counselor position this summer, because I care deeply about the future of young girls. They are the women that will one day be women that populate the hell out of our world, breathing and breeding and keeping our glorious nation alive. Our very own world– the very same one we are currently living in! They are the women of tomorrow and I would like to help beat them into shape the way a blacksmith beats things into shape in his forge.  
>    
>  My résumé is enclosed for your perusal, but I've also taken the time to lay out the facts for you.
> 
> **YOUR REQUIREMENTS:**  
>  \- Ages 16-18  
>  \- First Aid Certification  
>  \- Criminal Record Check  
>  \- Outdoor camping and leadership experience  
>  \- Certifications in swimming, canoeing, kayaking, ropes courses, and/or wilderness first aid are an asset  
>  \- A love of working with children, nurturing and guiding young women into the leaders of tomorrow  
>    
>  **MY QUALIFICATIONS:**  
>  \- I'm 16.  
>  \- I keep it real.  
>  \- I would die for anything.  
>  \- I'm not allergic to anything that I know of yet.  
>  \- My brother helped me master the Rainbow Loom. Little girls are absolutely bonkers for that right now. You need me. I need you. Think about it.
> 
> Thank you for the time you have taken reviewing my credentials and experience. I look forward to meeting you for an interview.  
>    
>  Sincerely,  
>  Louise Belcher  
>  Bob's Burgers on Ocean Avenue  
>  kuchikuchikoo22@wharfmail.com

  


•

 

"Three weeks is a long time, Louise," Bob said. He stood in the doorway of the walk-in closet that had remained Louise's bedroom since childhood, his silhouette nearly blocking all the light from the hallway. She sat on the side of her bed, a clipboard on her lap. She had borrowed it from the restaurant. Extracting a promise from her to return it had been the first thing her dad had brought up when she'd opened the door.  
  
"I know," she said. She stared down at her list. _Two toothbrushes_ , she'd written on it. Two? Why had she written two? For what reason would she need two? Louise tried to remember what she'd been thinking when she'd compiled the packing list.  
  
"You've never been away from home for that long," he said cautiously.  
  
Louise knew exactly what he was getting at, but she chose to ignore it. "Kind of the point, Dad," she said airily, looking up at him for a moment, then back down at the list. "What would you need two toothbrushes for?"  
  
"Huh?" He looked like she'd lost him before his expression became thoughtful. "Uh... I guess.. One for brushing teeth, and one for scrubbing tough little spots in the grill... I guess... Maybe." He sounded uncertain. He always sounded uncertain about everything he said.  
  
"I'm not going to be standing over a grill at the camp, Dad." She stuck her jaw out and reached down to scratch her leg. "Again, that's kind of the point."  
  
"Well, I don't know. Are you expecting prison-style toilet cleaning duty?" He sounded tired.  
  
She gave it serious consideration, before deciding that it was a plausible theory. "Maybe," she said with trepidation. Two toothbrushes it was.  
  
Bob moved further into the room, ducking his head below the veil of the beaded curtain strung from wall to wall. Gene had helped her put it up two summers ago. He'd helped her bead it, too. When all the strands fell together, they created a psychedelic mosaic. Gene had given it an artistic name; the placard ( _The Innate Hysteria of Consciousness – Gene and Louise Belcher, 2013, pony beads and string_ ) was in her closet somewhere. She had yet to nail it to the wall.  
  
Her father sat down on the bed next to her. Louise lifted the clipboard to her chest so he couldn't see the remaining items; there was no reason her dad should ever know the number of pairs of underwear she planned to bring, or the fact that a switchblade and a lighter were on the list.  
  
But Bob wasn't sitting next to her to read the list. He wasn't even looking at her. He sat in the most dadlike way possible, knees apart, one hand on each knee. "You could get homesick," he said, his voice dragging. "You remember what it was like for Tina just doing that one semester abroad. How she called all the time, and that whole thing with almost getting arrested by the Swiss police... She was homesick."  
  
_She wasn't homesick,_ Louise wanted to say. _There was no way she was, because I got every single detail, every day, about how much she wanted to do her homestay partner._ But she stayed quiet.  
  
"And," her father continued, looking resolutely out at the wall opposite the bed. The women of Sleater-Kinney stared back at him from a huge, signed poster Louise had bought off of eBay. "It's just that your mother and I are wor–"  
  
Louise choked. She held up a hand. "HAHA," she said loudly, effectively silencing him. "That's great, Dad, and I'm really sorry. I get it. I seriously do." She waited a moment, just to be extra sure that she had cut off any chance of him finishing that sentence. "It's that you're going to miss me and you think it's gonna be tough on me because I'm your youngest kid." She ignored the sudden dryness in her throat and squared her shoulders. "The _real_ question is why you're in here, but not Mom."  
  
"She sent me. She said she's too emotional about this," said Bob, and that was truly all the explanation Louise required. She set the clipboard face-down on the bed and rested her head on her father's shoulder, letting out a long sigh. She let the silence stretch on before speaking.  
  
"Think of it like a vacation from me," she said.  
  
"Nobody wants to take a vacation from you, Louise," said her father awkwardly. "We like having you here."  
  
It was validation she never asked or, and never really needed, but she smiled nonetheless. "Thanks, Dad," she said warmly. Bob turned to look at her, smiling too. All at once she felt embarrassed and sat back up. "Now get outta here. I need to finish packing," she added hastily.  
  
Bob sighed, but he stood, patting her on the shoulder. "Your mother keeps spare toothbrushes in our bathroom," he said, and left.

  


•

 

"It's essentially a three-week slumber party. You know that, right? You _hate_ slumber parties. You hate 'em! I'd say I never got why, but I get it. _Misanthropy_."  
  
Gene was laying back on the grass as he said this to Louise, staring into the sun. The last few days of classes were winding down– the close to another school year. It didn't feel like a huge event for Louise; she still had another year to suffer through, after all. But Gene had just graduated– the ceremony had been last week. He'd gone to prom in a gown, all theatrics and excitement, and he'd looked kind of amazing in it. His date had been some guy he'd met online who had traveled hours by bus just to be there. It was kind of sweet, in a way. Louise had a bunch of their selfies saved from Snapchat.  
  
"I mean, if you're sure..." Gene continued, rolling over onto his stomach with some effort to look at her. "But that's what it is. A three-week slumber party in the forest with a bunch of little girls. And you gotta be as wholesome as possible. Wholesome!"  
  
Louise tore up fistfuls of grass. In the distance, their classmates milled about the lawn, trying to make the most of their lunch period. She could smell cigarette smoke wafting from beyond the fence. Gene was right. 'Three-week slumber party' was probably an apt descriptor of what she'd signed herself up for. Voluntarily, at that. This was some sacrificial-young-adult-novel-heroine-in-a-dystopian-world shit.  
  
She thought back to the one ill-fated slumber party her mother had forced upon her years ago. She remembered it as nothing but hours of torture, although in the end it honestly hadn't been that bad. Sure, most of her guests had bailed, and it had been her fault, but she'd had fun in the end with the girl who stayed. Her name had been Jessica. She was hard to conjure a mental image of– Louise could scarcely remember her face. They'd spent a bit of time together even after the sleepover (although the rest of her guests ignored her for months), but her family had moved away less than a year later, and she hadn't thought about her since then.  
  
It had been an altogether unpleasant experience, even if it had been alright towards the end. Louise hated people invading her space, or bursting her bubble, or breathing too much of the same air.  
  
"It pays well–" she began.  
  
"Not enough, sister."  
  
"–and it also pays in _experience_ ," Louise said, trying to sound like this was what she was doing it for instead of the five hundred dollars per week.  
  
"Experience," Gene repeated, and then he laughed. She threw grass at him.  
  
"You just graduated," she said, to change the topic. "What are _you_ gonna do with your life, Gene? Can't spend all day getting up in my bidness."  
  
Gene had an answer prepared for her. He sat up, grass in his hair, his dark eyes bright. "I told you– gap year." He spread his arms wide, then squared his fingers, framing the sky, and then Louise's face, between them. "Here's what I'm thinking– _backpacking across Asia._ " He gave the last three words a dramatic flourish.  
  
"Sounds like a really bad idea," she said. "Go for it."  
  
"I _will_ ," he said with determined enthusiasm. "Well, I mean, I have to. I already bought my ticket to Thailand."  
  
Somehow this information did not surprise her. "What about your boyfriend?" she asked.  
  
"He's coming too."  
  
"Gene," she groaned.  
  
He grinned at her. "I'm kidding. I'm going it alone. We're already long-distance anyway. I figure more distance, no big deal. If we're meant to be, we'll hold strong! You feel me?"  
  
"No." Louise considered herself to be functionally aromantic and asexual, and she liked it that way. Relationships and all that followed were a grey landscape she had never felt the desire to navigate.  
  
Gene already knew this, which was why he didn't pry or insist on her agreement. Instead, he wound the conversation back to where it had begun. "Are you gonna write to us?"  
  
"If you want," she said in a noncommittal manner, even though she'd already bought the stationery to do so.  
  
"I'm kind of jealous," he sighed. "All my life I've wanted to be able to tell a spicy story about summer camp, and I've never gone. Now you're going, and you're definitely going to have all kinds of spicy adventures."  
  
Louise pursed her lips together. "There aren't going to be any spicy adventures. It's me and a bunch of girls. It's not co-ed, Gene." All of the 'spicy' scenarios she could imagine came in two varieties: horror-movie style, where an axe murderer would surely attack the camp, or teen-movie style, with male campers going on panty raids. Neither was very appealing, unless she could play the part of the hero in the former. "I'm thinking of starting a little side business, though. Smuggling in candy and stuff? It's banned at the camp and I'm sure everyone'll go crazy for my little black market."  
  
"That's my sister!" hollered Gene, landing her in a headlock. She learned a long time ago that it was best not to struggle. He smacked her on the back. "Extortion. Just like Mom when she went all Lady of Darkness."  
  
The thing he referred to was almost two years ago, when their mother had taken a part-time job as a dominatrix. There had been nothing sexual to it– at least nothing Linda had to do. Louise had been thrilled when she'd learned that some men actually _liked_ being treated like shit for nothing in return and that they'd be content just to lick a woman's used shoes and then _pay_ her for it. ' _DREAM JOB_ ,' she'd said, before her parents promptly banned her from ever doing any such thing. That had been a wild six months for their family– it had ended when Linda said her Amazon wishlist had been completed in full. They'd nearly refurbished the whole restaurant with it.  
  
"It's not extortion. It's taking advantage of a situation," she said reasonably. Gene let her go.  
  
"You're my _hero_ ," he sighed admirably, sagging against her. "I'm gonna miss you. I mean, I will while you're at camp, but _also_ when I'm searching my soul deep in Cambodia."  
  
That was too much mush for one sentence. Louise recoiled even as her face warmed. "You won't even be thinking about me," she teased him.  
  
"Only when I'm drinking ayahuasca."  
  
"Gene, you can only find that in, like, South America."  
  
"DAMN."

  


•

 

Although Louise could drive– she'd gotten her license before Gene or Tina even had, a fact she was fond of pointing out often to the both of them– the trip out to Gold Ridge Lake was two hours, and their family had only one car to their name. Someone would have to drive the car back. It was a bright Sunday morning right at the beginning of July; the sun had just come up, and Louise and her mother were loading the car.  
  
It was early enough that the birds had just begun to trill, and very few cars zipped down the street. Linda elbowed Louise's duffel bag into the trunk, huffing and, Louise thought, flexing a little.  
  
"There!" Linda proclaimed, finally managing to wedge it between the spare tire and the old toaster oven everyone kept saying they'd drop off for donation but never did. "Alright, honey. Let's get on our way. It's almost seven and I wanna stop at that cute little donut place on the way. You know the one down by the highway? I almost never get to go there! It's too out of the way. Oh, but if I lived a life on the road I could eat there all the time."  
  
"You should definitely do that, Mom," said Louise seriously as she accepted the keys and climbed into the driver's seat. "You should become a trucker." Her bunny ears folded over her eyes, squashed down by the ceiling. She reached up to push them back as she started up the car.  
  
"You think?" asked her mother thoughtfully as she buckled her seatbelt. That was what Louise adored about her mother– that she took every ridiculous suggestion as a serious one, and always weighed the options fairly. There was a lot of their mother in Gene, she'd realized a long time ago. Both of them were too sincere for their own good. "Nah, I don't think I could do it. Not even for cute little donut places."  
  
Louise backed out, swinging the wheel. "What if you do?" she pressed. "What if I come back in three weeks and everything's changed, huh? You're a truck driver, Dad's expanded his tramp stamp into a full-body artwork, Gene's joined a gang-"  
  
"Your father has low pain tolerance. He would never get a full-body tattoo."  
  
"Give him some credit," she said as they set off down the street.  
  
"Three weeks," Linda sighed. "Oh, Louise." Her voice thickened as she raised a hand to her throat. "Feels like how it felt when Tina went to college!"  
  
"Tina still lives at home, except for that one semester abroad."  
  
"You're all growing up so fast!" said her mother as though she couldn't hear her, before setting off into a number of different childhood stories.  
  
An hour later, they stopped at the donut place. It had taken a few detours, and Louise was growing restless and ready to get to the camp already, but she sensed that this was important to her mother for more than just the tiny powdered donut holes– which Linda sat eating by the handful inside the cafe.  
  
This would probably be good for the whole family, she told herself. Her dad was right: she really had never been away from home for so long before, so this would be a good time to learn what it would be like to be on her own, and for the rest of her family to get a sense of what things might be like without her. Louise's goals were loftier than Tina's, even if they didn't stretch as far as Gene's; she was only half-sure she wanted to go to college, but she wanted to go somewhere else and experience something different. There would be no bizarre backpacking trip across Asia for her, but if she could at least move downstate for school, she'd be happy.  
  
"Of courf we'll be seein' you again soon enouff," said her mother, her accent thicker than ever through her mouthful of donut.  
  
Louise waited for her to finish eating. "Exactly," she said. "Three weeks isn't that long. Like, I can still remember what I was doing three weeks ago from _now_ and it feels like yesterday."  
  
Linda nodded, looking like she'd agree with just about anything reassuring at the moment. She smiled. "I won't touch your room or nothing while you're gone! Well, I might go in and sweep up a little."  
  
"Don't you dare," said Louise, nearly dropping her coffee.  
  
"I'm joking!" said her mother.  
  
"There's a padlock on the door."  
  
"Jesus," said her mother.  
  
"You'd have to get the bolt cutters," Louise went on. "And I hid them. First clue to their location's taped under the kitchen table."  
  
"Oh," said Linda, reaching across the table for her, "I'm gonna miss you so much."

  


•

 

The camp was a lot smaller than the pictures had made it seem. It was nestled deep into a featureless forest, cupping one end of a reasonably-sized lake. Ginny had told her it was brand new, and it definitely looked it. The modestly-sized cabins were still gleaming with wood stain. She followed the director around, listening to her repeat things she had surely said a dozen times before.  
  
"There's two days of training for staff," said Ginny with her typical nervousness, sliding her gaze back and forth across the campgrounds. They walked together past the mess hall and towards the staff building. Now and then they passed signs hammered into the ground; each one bore a different Thundergirls lesson. The one they passed now read _BE YOUR OWN RAY OF SUNSHINE._ What? Louise stifled a laugh. Ginny gave her a stern look over one plump shoulder before continuing. "...Two days, and then the campers arrive. You're assigned to a cabin, and you'll be with that cabin for the rest of this thing. You'll have one co-counselor who will be assigned to the same cabin."  
  
A co-counselor. Good. Someone to shove the work off on. "How many cabins are there?" Louise asked, trying to sound engaged.  
  
"Ten," said Ginny. "There's Star, Moon, Sun, Rainbow-"  
  
_Seriously_? "I get it!" Louise said hastily.  
  
"You're assigned to Twinkle Cabin."  
  
She sputtered, then burst into laughter. She reached up and slung an arm around Ginny's shoulders. "You're joking, right? There's no such thing as a _Twinkle Cabin?_ "  
  
"Miss Belcher," said Ginny, gently extricating her arm. "If you had read the manual, you'd already know that. But you haven't, and I am already paying the price."  
  
"I'll read the manual," said Louise halfheartedly.  
  
Ginny turned to look at her. "Louise, I hired you because I think you have potential. Lots of it! Lots of potential to be a role model, despite..." She eyed her up and down with a look that seemed slightly despairing. "Despite your, er, tendency to... march to the beat of your own drum. I think that this experience could be as beneficial for you as it will be for all of our campers."  
  
It was the same kind of drivel Louise was accustomed to hearing from authority figures who always insisted that she could be something incredible if she would just apply herself more. But she nodded.  
  
"Now let's go," said Ginny. "I'll get you your uniform. We start training after lunch today– that's twelve-thirty. Until then, you are free to set your belongings up in Twinkle Cabin."  
  
Twinkle Cabin. _God._

  


•

 

By the time she made her way back to her assigned cabin, it was almost eleven-thirty. She had already mentally mapped a great deal of the campgrounds, sketching a small diagram into the front cover of her Official Thundergirls Camp Counselor Manual. There were probably additional places to explore, and she intended to find them later.  
  
Twinkle Cabin wasn't hard to find. Each cabin had a wood carving of the symbol representing its name hung over the doorway. Twinkle Cabin's carving looked like a bunch of sparkles. They were little diamond shapes painted purple and pink. Louise paused beneath the door frame and jumped, trying to catch the sign in her hands. She was too short to do so, and gave up after a few tries, pushing open the door and heading inside.  
  
The inside of the cabin was very sparse and dimly lit. She was immediately greeted by four bunk beds squashed into the front. Beyond that was a small space for shelves and cabinets, and then behind those was another bunk bed on its own. _Okay_ , Louise thought to herself, _I am going to be sleeping way over there no matter what any eight-year-old girl tries to tell me._ She walked past the crowded area and to the back of the cabin.  
  
She found someone already standing there. There was a tall girl with her back mostly turned, unpacking a suitcase. She was already wearing her uniform. That particular shade of light blue would never be flattering on anyone, Louise decided, least of all with this girl's reddish-blonde hair.  
  
This had to be her co-counselor. "Hey," she said to announce her arrival.  
  
The girl turned. They stared at each other, although Louise did most of the staring, and then a double-take, because recognition had hit her like a truck. She squinted, and then the creases in her expression smoothed into surprise.  
  
" _Jessica_?"  
  
The girl refocused her gaze. She made a face. Louise wasn't sure what kind of face, exactly. It wasn't surprise, but it wasn't happy or sad or angry or anything like that. It was just an expression of recognition.  
  
It had taken Louise a moment to recognize her. It was the specific shade of strawberry blonde hair that gave her away, because everything else about her was so plain as to be completely forgettable. It was no wonder that Louise had gradually become incapable of remembering what she looked like once a few years had passed. Jessica embodied the 'face in a crowd' metaphor. The only thing that stood out about her was her height– nearly a head taller than Louise. Her jaw-length hair framed a sharp but unmemorable face. She was club soda, just like Louise remembered her. She was flour. She was plain ramen noodles right out of the bag. She was white rice.  
  
Louise cast her memories back, trying to recall the few times she had spent with Jessica before she had moved away. She'd come pretty close to being someone Louise could call a friend, once. She'd proven herself and shown real grit, and Louise had been forced to respect that. But she couldn't reconcile the cunning, fast-talking, lock-picking girl she'd nearly befriended with the tall, expressionless one before her that seemed to still be considering the merits of the brands of shampoo she held in her hands.  
  
"Hi, Louise," Jessica said blandly, meeting, exceeding, and failing every single one of Louise's expectations all at the same time. "It's been a while." She set down the shampoo bottles on the shelf wedged precariously between the bunk bed and the wall.  
  
"It sure has!" Louise responded before she could think through what she wanted to say, dosing it with triple her usual sarcasm. Something about Jessica's unaffected acknowledgment of the reappearance of a childhood maybe-friend in such a bizarre, random setting irritated her. "It's a small world after all. Where've ya been all this time?"  
  
"Wellington," she said in response to Louise's rhetorical question. Her expression hadn't changed.  
  
"I guess we're co-counselors," said Louise, blinking. _God, this is weird,_ she thought, before repeating the thought out loud: "God, this is weird."  
  
Jessica nodded. "Yeah. It really kind of is." She lifted a hand and swept her hair out of her eyes. "You've changed."  
  
Louise looked down at herself, then back up at Jessica. _Yeah,_ she thought. She couldn't blame Jessica for that assessment. It had been years, after all. Suddenly she felt self-conscious of her septum piercing, of her bitten-down nails, of the makeup she refused to wear, of the bunny ears she still wore to this day. But then again, Jessica seemed to have hardly changed at all. If she was going to pass judgment, she was the wrong person to do it to. "You're still the same," she said somewhat guardedly.  
  
But Jessica had nothing else to add; if she was judging Louise, she kept it to herself. "Yeah," she said, simply agreeing. Then her tone lifted a little. "It's nice to see you again."  
  
Louise huffed, unsure of what to say in return. She remembered the one thing about Jessica that had stunned her way back then: that it was impossible to know what she was thinking. Apparently, that part hadn't changed, either. "Yeah, yeah," she said, although her irritation was already seeping away.  
  
Jessica was unaffected by Louise's tone. She hauled her suitcase into her arms and bumped a hip against the sink that jutted from the wall. "Which bunk do you want?" She jerked her chin up and then down at each one. "I was waiting for my co-counselor to show up. You know, to keep things fair. So which is it?"  
  
Louise stared at the bunk bed. "That depends," she said. "Do you still wet the bed?" It came out of her mouth completely unbidden– not barbed cruelly, but matter-of-fact. Blunt, as she always had been. If Jessica couldn't handle that, Louise decided, she would be in for three weeks of hell. Louise wasn't going to let club soda dilute her experience here.  
  
But Jessica didn't miss a beat. She didn't even blink. She simply stood there, not even breaking eye contact. She smiled, then spoke dryly. "I walked right into that one."  
  
Something crumpled in Louise, and she cracked a smile, too. Relief washed over her. "Pretty much," she said, grinning. "You take the top one."  
  
Jessica tossed her suitcase onto the top bunk, then grasped onto the ladder to climb up there after it. She leaned over the side to look at Louise conspiratorially. "Can you believe we got the cabin named _Twinkle_?"  
  
"That has been pissing me off _all morning_!" Louise barked, laughing. "Please tell me you didn't read the manual either."  
  
"Of course not," said Jessica. "I didn't even bring it with me."  
  
This bit of solidarity was immensely reassuring, somehow. Louise was sure what the next three weeks would be a huge test of her patience no matter what– but here was someone she might just be able to get along with, and that could go a long way in the face of trying to wrangle a bunch of eight-year-old girls.  
  
_Brace for impact,_ Louise decided as they looked at one another.


	2. advanced obstacle course tactics

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a monster because I had a lot that needed to get out of the way. One caution, for those it might be relevant to: there is vomit mentioned near the end of this chapter, but not in detail.

Louise smoothed out the inner cover of her Official Thundergirls Camp Counselor Manual, stared at the map she had penciled onto it, and mentally gauged the distance between Twinkle Cabin, the staff building, and the mess hall. She was due there in half an hour, but she had something else to take care of first— namely, the matter of the forty-eight page manual she held in her hands. She had gotten off on the wrong foot with Ginny in every possible way, several times over, and while she still had no plans to actually read the manual, she had already come up with a solution.  
  
After they'd worked out the bunk bed situation and Louise had unpacked just enough to be able to change into her official uniform, Jessica had taken off, saying that she wanted to be in the mess hall early. Louise headed out for the staff building, clamping a pencil between her teeth so that she could make adjustments to her map if necessary.  
  
Her uniform was as unflattering and uncomfortable as expected. The light blue shirt felt itchy on her skin, particularly around the collar, where it pinched tight at her neck. Louise tolerated the feeling for about three seconds before she reached up to pop the buttons down to her clavicle. Worse, the shirt was paired with taupe shorts that ended above the knee and sported cargo pockets. They were the worst thing Louise had ever put on her legs, and that included the slimy seaweed wrap she had allowed her mother to give her during one mother-daughter spa night last year. There was also an accompanying baseball cap, which wouldn't have been so bad, but it meant that Louise had to take a pair of scissors to the top to turn it into a visor, because there was no way in hell she was going to swap her rabbit ears for it. The whole ensemble was an evolved version of the ugly troop uniform she and Tina had worn so many years ago. Louise felt like she had leveled up, but only by sacrificing her dignity.  
  
On her way to the staff building, she passed another of the wooden signs that were planted in the grass all over the camp. This one said _A SMILE IS THE BEST MAKEUP YOU CAN WEAR_. God, what kind of life lessons was this camp planning on instilling in these little girls? Who was in charge of authoring these slogans? Louise resolved to come back to revisit that one with a permanent marker.  
  
The staff building was slightly out of the way, slanting off to the side of the recreational hall (which, she noted, seemed to have only one redeeming feature: a pool). She walked up to it and peered through the screen door, watching and listening.  
  
"Ginny?" she called. There was no reply. She tried the door. It opened easily. She was irritated to find that it was air conditioned inside, whereas Twinkle Cabin decidedly was not. The foyer of the staff building was plain and unremarkable, branching off into a hallway on both sides. The closest door had a sign which read _CAMP DIRECTOR_. That had to be where Ginny spent her time performing whatever the hell it was camp directors did.  
  
There was no sign of said director anywhere. Louise pulled out her phone and began searching for a Wi-Fi connection. Only one came up: _TGoffice_. It wasn't even secured; Louise was a little disappointed at that, because she had a number of possible password guesses ready. Still, it would save her some time, and as soon as she was connected, she began composing an e-mail.

  


> **TO:** Tina Belcher (charm.bomb@friendfiction.net)  
>  **FROM:** Louise B ✌ (kuchikuchikoo22@wharfmail.com)  
>  **SENT:** July-03-15 12:09:54 PM  
>  **SUBJECT:** BOYZ4NOW IS BREAKING UP  
>  **ATTACHMENTS:** _OfficialTGCampManual_2015.PDF,_ _I Knew I Loved You Before I Knocked You Up (B4N RPF, A/B/O, Mpreg).ZIP_
>
>> J/K on the title. I just wanted to make sure you'd read this e-mail as soon as you saw it. Boyz4Now isn't breaking up, so I hope you haven't dropped dead. I hope you're still alive so that you can read this e-mail. TINA ARE YOU ALIVE??? TINA YOU NEED TO KEEP IT TOGETHER FOR THE FAMILY  
>    
>  If you aren't dead, here's what I have to say:  
>    
>  I snuck into Ginny's office to use the Wi-Fi and send this. FYI, she keeps mentioning you and I think that she wishes you were here instead of me. I've been here for less than half a day, so I'd say I'm making a pretty great impression on her.  
>    
>  Anyway, basically the deal is that I haven't read the manual and I don't plan on doing it either, because I have a life, even out here in the middle of the woods. Therefore I need you to e-mail me back with a summary of the Official Thundergirls Camp Counselor Manual. I know the camp was invented long after you left the organization, so I've attached a PDF of it. Please read it and send me back a summary of all the important things in it in bullet point form (10 bullet points or less, because I don't have all day). I would have asked you sooner, like before I left, but I underestimated how important the manual apparently is, so I need to at least know the basics. I don't want to go through 48 pages of improving the self-esteem of little girls, so I'm leaving it up to you. But I'm not asking you for no reason— there's something in it for you, sis.  
>    
>  If you do this for me, I will tell you the password to unlock the ZIP folder which you will also find attached to this e-mail. It is that fanfic you have been looking for. You know it. THE ONE. I know you thought I wasn't listening when you told me about that story that got pulled off of every website after the author had a total meltdown yeeeeears ago, and mostly I wasn't. But I listened enough to remember the name, and, yeah, I found it. It took a lot of searching of the deepest, ugliest parts of the internet, but I've had it in my possession for about a year and I've been waiting for the right time to offer it to you. Do the above mentioned task for me, and it will be yours. 273k words of pregnant Griffin/Allen porking, Tina. I mean, I haven't actually READ it, but I skimmed some of the chapters and the phrase 'undulating rectum' came up a few times, and that's your shit. It's up to you. The ball is in your court.  
>    
>  Love, Louise  
>    
>  PS — Do you remember Jessica? Bland, boring Jessica? She's here. She's my co-counselor. We're in charge of Twinkle Cabin. I can't believe the words I just wrote are all true.

  


She skimmed the e-mail briefly to review it, and then hit _SEND_ with confidence. Tina was highly reliable and always punctual with favors. Technically she probably didn't even need to offer her the fanfiction — Tina was a sweetheart, always ready to lend a hand — but Louise felt it to be appropriate compensation for a rush job.

Louise checked the time. She had about fifteen minutes before she would need to haul ass to the mess hall. She looked towards the door indicating Ginny's office, and decided that she would at least have to try to see if it was unlocked. It wouldn't be like her if she didn't; she owed to to herself and everything Louise Belcher stood for to check. She tried the handle.

Kismet. The door swung open. Louise flicked on the light. "Well," she said aloud, "because the door is unlocked, I cannot be blamed for taking a quick look around."

Trying the desk first, Louise was disappointed to find that none of the drawers contained anything interesting. She turned instead to the cabinet in the corner and hauled it open. It was lined with carefully labelled envelopes laid out in alphabetical order. She moved straight to _B._ Disappointingly, her file contained only her résumé and cover letter, along with the paperwork she'd put through to be hired. She was about to close the drawer when she reconsidered and began thumbing through the rest. They were all names she did not recognize, although she paused on one, curious: _SIEVERS, Jessica_.

Plucking the folder free, she spread it flat on the desk. Just like her own file, it contained paperwork, along with a résumé and cover letter. Louise scanned both, unsure of what to expect, but she was startled to find a considerable work history attached; Jessica had apparently held a handful of steady jobs for the past three years. She had three references listed, and her cover letter was composed so academically that Louise could barely make it through the first paragraph.

 _Okay,_ she thought, _so she's an overachiever._ And yet she claimed to have not read the manual. Louise resolved to explore this inconsistency later. She was about to push the drawer shut when she spotted another surname: _FROCK_. A prickling dread settled immediately into Louise's entire body, melting her to the floor. Oh, no. _Oh, no._

Hoping against hope, Louise pried the folder open with just the tips of her fingers, feeling that she wouldn't be surprised if a rattlesnake leapt forth from it. She opened it just far enough to confirm the first name: _Millie_.

"Son of a bitch," she rasped, snapping the drawer shut.

It was bad enough that Millie Frock was already her nemesis. Louise was all for having a nemesis— she truly was. Ever since childhood, she had been keen on the idea of having someone to conveniently hate and fight with all the time. Tina was all about scoring a boyfriend with a firm backside, but Louise was more discerning; she wanted something _greater_.

But Millie wasn't what she'd signed up for. Millie had, since third grade, been so much more than just a thorn in her side. She was a Bowie knife. She was utterly determined to be involved in Louise's life no matter what. She had eventually come to realize that it didn't matter to Millie one way or another whether or not they were friends or enemies. Simply being paid attention to was all Millie was after, and ignoring her didn't work. For a short, blissful time, Louise had enjoyed a very happy reprieve from her existence when they had attended separate middle schools, but on her first day of high school, there Millie had been, a huge smile on her face, yelling _When I say Lou, you say Ise! Lou!_

But they hadn't spoken for nearly a year. Not since, Louise thought to herself glumly, Andy and Ollie's disastrous sixteenth birthday party. And now Millie was here at the very same summer camp she would be spending the next three weeks at. At least they weren't co-counselors. The very thought of that narrowly-avoided fate made her shudder.

It was a bridge that she would have to cross — and then promptly burn — when she came to it. It was getting close to half past noon, and Louise knew she had to get to the mess hall already. She shoved her phone back in her hideous cargo shorts and hurried out of the staff building.  
  


•

  


The mess hall had obviously been built to host around a hundred people, but given that the campers weren't to arrive until tomorrow evening, right now it seemed sad and empty with less than thirty people gathered in it. Most of them appeared to be counselors, judging by the amount of them wearing the same unflattering uniform Louise was sporting. The moment she spotted Jessica, she walked immediately towards her; it was a better option than hovering around until Millie spotted her. She refused to look around the room to even confirm her presence, not wanting to accidentally make eye contact.  
  
"You made it," said Jessica, looking down at her, and then: "What the hell did you do to your hat?"  
  
Louise reached up and touched her improvised visor. "I did what had to be done," she said, taking herself completely seriously.  
  
Jessica snorted, before looking to the front of the hall. Ginny was there, looking as neurotic as ever, as well as a few senior staff members. The camp's tired-looking director gave a few welcoming words, followed by a highly unmemorable speech containing several inspiring metaphors about the women of tomorrow, or something; by the end of it, Louise's stomach was growling, and she bounded up and headed right over to grab a tray and get in line to eat. Jessica meandered behind her, looking like she had all the time in the world.  
  
As they stood in line, Louise could not shake off the feeling that someone was watching her, but she kept her eyes leveled on her tray. Eventually, it became too much, and she spoke in a low voice, addressing her co-counselor.  
  
"Jessica," she said in a harsh whisper. The girl she was addressing was staring down at a basket of bread rolls, as if contemplating how many sesame seeds she wanted on hers. " _Jessica._ "  
  
"What," said Jessica without looking up at her. Louise wanted to shake her.  
  
"Can you please look around the hall and tell me if there's a girl with curly blonde hair and a mouth that kind of looks like Ghostface's and eyes like Hannibal Lecter's staring into my soul."  
  
Jessica looked up from the bread rolls and stared at Louise, looking as if she wanted to say something, but instead she just looked around the hall as asked. Her eyes stopped at one particular point. "Oh, yeah," she said, and then her mouth pulled up in a smirk. She grabbed a bread roll and slid down the queue. "There totally is. How'd you pull that off?"  
  
The news didn't surprise her, but it made her heart sink with dread. "I didn't!" Louise hissed. "That's Millie. You remember Millie from Wagstaff, right? You know, basically the embodiment of why _no one likes the female gender?_ "  
  
Jessica slid her tray forward for a serving of salad. "You're female."  
  
"I know! And I hate all of us," said Louise passionately. "But I hate Millie Frock the _most_."  
  
"You haven't changed at all, Louise," said Jessica, and Louise couldn't make up her mind as to whether or not her tone was complimentary, which threw her off of her rhythm a little.  
  
"Right— right," she said, getting back on track. "Look, let's just say that the last time Millie and I had it out, heads rolled. Not literally, which might have been cool, but emotionally."  
  
"Oh," said Jessica. "I get it. She stole your boyfriend, right?"  
  
Louise fumbled the fork she was reaching for, feeling a wave of disgust. "Holy shit," was all she could think of to say. "No. _God_ , no."  
  
"Well, you obviously want me to ask," said Jessica, laughing. "So here I am, asking, even though I'm not sure why you can't just ignore her."  
  
They stopped by the soda fountain, which seemed to be the one sophisticated thing in the haphazardly constructed mess hall. Louise peered around it, hoping desperately for coffee, and found only an offering of various types of tea in small branded packets. She blanched and just filled her cup with water.  
  
"It's not much of a story," said Louise finally. She thought she could still feel Millie's judgmental laser stare in her back, but maybe she was just imagining it. "I reamed her out really bad in front of a lot of people. I said some pretty mean things."  
  
"Pretty mean things," said Jessica. "You? No way."  
  
Point given. Louise tried not to laugh. "We are going to have a super shitty three weeks if you're gonna spend them all throwing shade at me, Club Soda." She hauled her tray into both hands and began looking around for a table to sit down at.  
  
"Club Soda?" Jessica stared at her.  
  
"Uh," said Louise.  
  
"Yeah. You know what," said Jessica.  
  
"What?"  
  
"I'm not gonna ask."  
  
"Good plan," said Louise agreeably, and together they sat at a table that was pressed into a corner. Louise finally allowed herself to survey the rest of the hall. She watched several of the other girls sit in pairs, and assumed they must be co-counselors, as well. She wondered briefly which poor souls had been stuck with Rainbow Cabin. It was a small comfort to know that there was at least one other cabin with a name worse than Twinkle.  
  
She was gnawing on her bread roll, staunchly refusing to look around for signs of Millie, when Ginny appeared beside their table. A dog circled around her ankles, snuffling. Louise recognized it as the one that had been snoozing and sweating in the corner during her job interview. She leaned out of her seat and held out a hand towards it. A wet nose pressed into her palm.  
  
"How are you doing, girls?" Ginny asked mildly, but before either one of them could answer, she was staring at the top of Louise's head. "Miss Belcher, what is that."  
  
"That's what I asked," Jessica noted, jabbing at her pudding. Louise sat up from petting the dog and made her best look of betrayal.  
  
"The ears," she ventured helpfully, pointing them out to Ginny. "I always wear 'em. Always. It's pretty much a religious thing. You understand." Louise had barely gone a day in her life without some form of hat on her head, and for most of those days it had been the exact same one. It had changed a few times over the years; its current incarnation was crocheted, a little slouchy in the back, but it kept its usual two features: pink and bunny-eared.  
  
"Right," said Ginny defeatedly. "It's... fetching. Anyway, here's today's training schedule." For the first time Louise noticed that she held a stack of papers under one arm. She pressed two sheets down on the table. Louise flipped hers over to read along as Ginny summarized. "We'll begin with a basic overview of camp rules and regulations and your duties here. We'll examine the layout of the campgrounds and cover a brief summary of how the next three weeks will be laid out. After that, we'll be reviewing our first aid training. That will be followed by a test later this evening, and another tomorrow."  
  
"When do we get to do something exciting?" asked Louise, frowning down at the paper. "Like advanced obstacle course tactics?"  
  
She expected Jessica to stay silent upon this latest attempt at unnerving Ginny, but was surprised to hear her pipe up, speaking dispassionately over a forkful of salad: "Or a lesson on what to do if a serial killer shows up?"  
  
There was something about her toneless delivery that caused Louise to choke with violent, chest-rattling laughter. She began coughing.  
  
"I'll take it into consideration," Ginny said, looking as though she deeply regretted pairing the two of them together. "Please be at the staff building by two in the afternoon."  
  
She turned to go. Remembering something urgent, Louise regained her composure and reached out for her arm. "Uh, can I talk to you about something?"  
  
"What is it, Louise?" Ginny groaned, stuck in a half-turn. The dog at her heels barked.  
  
"Coffee," she said. "Do you have coffee here?"  
  
"Miss Belcher," was all Ginny said, and then she walked away to the next table to begin her spiel about the schedule all over again.  
  
Jessica watched her go. "No offense," she said to Louise, "but I think you're basically one of the last people who should be drinking coffee."  
  
"How do you think I got this way," groaned Louise into her water.

  


•

  


The first thing Louise did once she was back in the staff building was reach for her phone and hook back up to the Wi-Fi, but Tina hadn't yet sent her a reply. Louise imagined that she was furiously trying to finish the manual— that, or she was trying to find a brute-force program to open the .ZIP, but she figured that her sister wouldn't do something so wily. It was much more likely that she was going about it the fair way.  
  
Thinking about Tina put a little pang in her chest, which was ridiculous, because she had been away from her family for less than a day. _Oh, God,_ thought Louise with sudden horror. _Three weeks of heartburn._ That had to be what it was. Heartburn. It definitely had nothing to do with missing her family. She resolved to break into Ginny's office again and look for Pepto-Bismol later.  
  
There was a classroom located at the far end of one hallway that would apparently be where most of the training would take place. Louise had to remind herself that she was being paid for it all as she took her seat, but she couldn't help but feel that the classroom environment infringed on her basic summer vacation rights a little.  
  
That worry, however, was nothing compared to the face that suddenly appeared in front of hers. Louise backed up so fast that her chair nearly toppled over. She yelped.  
  
"Louise!" said Millie Frock brightly. It was the first thing she'd said to her in a year, but her voice was every bit as grating as Louise remembered.  
  
"Millie," she said weakly.  
  
"I waved to you in the mess hall. I guess you didn't see me?" said Millie, her eyes wide. She folded her hands, one on top of the other, on Louise's desk, leaning forward and gazing intensely into her eyes. Louise was reminded of how one should not make eye contact with aggressive dogs.  
  
"I guess I didn't," she said, and then stuck out her jaw. "Look, Millie. It would be great if we could go back to the ignoring-each-other thing."  
  
"Ooh, yeah," responded Millie, as though giving this idea great consideration. "I definitely thought about that! Then I was like, _naaah,_ we're _co-workers_ now! So even though I still think you are the worst person alive—"  
  
"Thank you," said Louise.  
  
"Water under the bridge!" said Millie triumphantly, making Louise recall her earlier thought about crossing and burning bridges. She was going to say something of the sort, but then Millie took a seat at the desk right next to her. "So," she trilled. "What cabin are you with, Louise? Mine's Sparkle."  
  
Louise could not believe what was happening. She saw Jessica in her peripheral vision taking a seat on the other side of her. Part of her wanted to turn and ask Jessica to switch seats so that she could have a buffer between herself and Millie, but she would, as she always had, handle Millie alone. Her pride would allow no compromises, which was something Louise normally touted smugly, but right now was a terrible hindrance and inconvenience, the same way most of the spectrum of human emotion felt to her.  
  
"Twinkle," she said finally.  
  
"Twinkle! Sparkle! They go together soooo well!" said-shrieked Millie. The muscles beneath Louise's eyes twitched involuntarily. She could hear Jessica make a sound of disbelief next to her.  
  
Reprieve came in the form of Ginny beginning the class. For once in her life, Louise listened raptly, mostly because her only other option was to acknowledge the fact that Millie kept elbowing her in the side. Louise knew exactly what she was doing, and why. She wasn't doing it to be friendly, or because it was all water under the bridge. She was doing it because it was a classic Millie Frock thing to do. Without the scrutinizing eyes of their high school classmates, in an unfamiliar environment, she was free to exact whatever revenge on Louise she wished. Louise supposed that she shouldn't feel surprised; Millie had probably been lying in wait for the better part of a year for an opportunity exactly like this one. Fate was not on her side here.  
  
Four hours and one first aid crash course later, they were set free to take a break for two hours. Louise's arms ached from doing compressions on the practice dummy. Ginny had advised them all to use the two hour break to eat dinner and brush up their knowledge of the manual before the test at eight o'clock, but Louise only wanted to head back to Twinkle Cabin to get away from Millie's oppressive staring.  
  
Jessica caught up with her outside of the staff building. They hadn't spoken much during class time, apart from one moment when Jessica had turned to her and mouthed, _Wow, she really is the worst_ when Millie managed to 'accidentally' drop her practice dummy right onto Louise.  
  
"I totally believe you now," Jessica informed her. "About Millie. Sorry about before. I guess some people can't be ignored."  
  
" _Thank you_ , Flour," said Louise, and it was only slightly sarcastic, because she genuinely did kind of appreciate Jessica's attempt at empathy.  
  
"Flour," said Jessica. "I thought it was Club Soda."  
  
"I can't decide," said Louise, trudging past another of the obnoxious inspirational wooden signs that littered the campgrounds. This particular sign proclaimed _YOUR DAY WILL GO THE WAY THE CORNERS OF YOUR MOUTH TURN_. Realizing that she was frowning deeply, Louise instinctively settled into a neutral scowl.  
  
"Why's she out for your blood, anyway?" Jessica asked, slowing her strides. Her legs were so long that one of her steps took two of Louise's to keep up.  
  
"I told you. Shit was _bad_ ," said Louise. "It got personal."  
  
"Then why don't you apologize?"  
  
"You don't get it. Millie doesn't do apologies. She's not normal. She doesn't approach _anything_ the way a normal person would. That's not how her mind works," said Louise decisively. She spotted Twinkle Cabin and changed her direction slightly.  
  
"Enlighten me," said Jessica.  
  
"Hell if I know," Louise was forced to admit. "I've been trying to figure out Millie for literally _years_." She pushed open the door to their cabin and immediately headed for her bed. The first thing she did was rip her hat-turned-visor off of her head, unbutton her shirt the rest of the way, and kick her shoes off. She dug her cell phone out of her shorts and was surprised to find a notification lighting up the screen.  
  
Tina's response had apparently arrived while they were in class. It was already loaded when Louise accessed her e-mail.

  


> **TO:** Louise B ✌ (kuchikuchikoo22@wharfmail.com)  
>  **FROM:** Tina Belcher (charm.bomb@friendfiction.net)  
>  **SENT:** July-03-15 05:25:09 PM  
>  **SUBJECT:** RE: BOYZ4NOW IS BREAKING UP
>
>> I threw up in my mouth at the subject line. It tasted terrible. I'd really appreciate it if you never did anything like that again.  
>    
>  First, I can't believe you've had the entirety of _I Knew I Loved You Before I Knocked You Up_ for a year without telling me. You're my sister, so I forgive you, but if I had the power to restructure the plotline of our lives, I would definitely write in some resentment on my character's part, and maybe even a long, winding revenge subplot. I can't help but think of how my life could have changed if you'd given it to me sooner. I guess we'll never know.  
>    
>  I read the manual for you. You should read it too, Louise. It's a really informative document that's been written with a lot of care and passion for everything the Thundergirls nobly stand for. But I've condensed the most important parts for you into seven bullet points:  
>    
>  • An Official Thundergirl Big Sister (that's your title within the organization if you didn't know that already) must always do her best to serve as a role model and mentor in every facet of her behavior, which ranges from grooming to the way she treats others  
>  • You are expected to go above and beyond the call of duty and perform at 110% all the time  
>  • You will embody the Thundergirls creed by being one with nature: you must treat nature as you would like to be treated (I think this means to not go pee in the woods)  
>  • You will take on all tasks asked of you with a smile  
>  • You must be fully prepared to handle emergency situations and are expected to take the role of a leader should they arise  
>  • All incidents, accidents, injuries, etc must be thoroughly documented  
>  • You will use your experience as an Official Thundergirl Big Sister to better yourself, your campers, your fellow Big Sisters, and the Thundergirls organization as a whole  
>    
>  That's basically it. Please give me the password now.

  


_Excellent_ , Louise thought as she scanned the e-mail. _I knew you'd pull through, sis._ She would have to remember to send her the password later when she could access the Wi-Fi again.

"Hey, Jessica," she said, looking up from her phone. "Have you touched that manual yet?"

Jessica swung her head over the top of her bunk to look down at Louise like a bat. "I was definitely sort of halfway almost considering it."

"Cheat sheet," said Louise, handing her her phone. Jessica took it and scanned the screen from her upside down position.

"What the hell is _I Knew I Loved You Before I Knocked You Up_?"

"I have been wondering that myself," said Louise. "I just know it involves Boyz4Now and duderuses."

"I think I'd read it," said Jessica, and then she scrolled down. "'Big Sister'? 'One with nature'?"

"I bet that's on the test," said Louise.

Jessica handed the phone back over. "Do you think a bunch of little girls are going to actually enjoy this whole thing? This ' _experience_ '? I don't think I would have liked this place as a kid."

"Dunno." Louise shrugged. "To be honest, I'm here because it pays five hundred dollars a week. And maybe more, if I can get my side business up and running."

Apparently the head rush of hanging upside down had become too much for Jessica, whose face was beginning to turn the same color as her hair, because she withdrew. When she spoke again, it was from above Louise's head, where she couldn't see her. "Side business?"

Louise couldn't decide whether or not she could trust Jessica on the matter. But it would be very hard to get a black market up and running out of her bed without the person on top of it in on the plan. She decided that she would have to recruit her. "I'm thinking of smuggling in junk food. Reselling it. You know how it goes. No one can live on salad and bread rolls for three entire weeks, especially not a bunch of snotty-nosed kids."

A blue shirt dropped off the side of the bed and crumpled to the floor. Louise could hear a suitcase unzipping. "So you're basically a scam artist. Not just a scam artist, but an immoral one."

"Basically," said Louise.

"How are you going to pull that off?" Jessica ventured.

Louise stretched out on her bed. She had already given the plan a great deal of consideration; she was a conscientious schemer, and it was a point of pride for her to always be well-prepared. "Here's what I'm thinking. There has to be _someplace_ that delivers basic necessities and shit here, right? There's no way they got three weeks' worth of food stockpiled in the mess hall. Deliveries are going to have to be made. I'm going to find out where they're coming from and I'm just gonna have a little something-something added."

Jessica laughed. The ladder at the side of the bunk squeaked as she climbed down, redressed in a white shirt. "Okay. So what's my percent for not squealing?"

"Wow." Louise did her best to look and sound offended. "Ten."

"Forty."

Oh, no. Louise was _not_ going to play this game with an amateur. She sat up. " _Ten._ "

"Half. I'll help." Jessica crossed her arms.

"Twenty, and you can be my assistant." Louise snorted.

"Oh, I'm sorry," said Jessica. "I thought you wanted to make money. It'd be a real shame if Ginny caught wind of this, Louise."

"Damn," she groaned. "Thirty for assisting me."

"Given my qualifications, I'd say forty is fair." Jessica stared at her in a manner that Louise chose to interpret as challenging, because that was how most people stared at her. She decided that she didn't want to take any chances on Jessica being the type to make good on her threats.

"Fine!" she heaved. "Fine, okay?"

Jessica laughed. "Great," she said. "'Cause I already got some ideas on how to make this thing work. You have a good plan to start with, but we're going to have to draw up some charts."

 _Charts_. Louise rolled her eyes, but she was smiling despite herself. "Okay, White Rice. But let's go grab dinner first." She hauled herself out of bed.

"White Rice," repeated Jessica. Louise thought she sounded amused.  
  


•

  


The first test had mostly focused on the first aid training they had received. Louise had always been a hands-on learner, and so that part had been easy. Tina's summary of the manual had actually helped a great deal in the questions that concerned basic tenets of the job, and when Louise handed in her paper she was certain that she had at the very least passed it, if not scored a solid B.  
  
By the time the test had drawn to a close, it was nine-thirty; Ginny reminded them all that curfew was at eleven, but until then they were free to pass the time as they wished. Her recommendation was the recreational hall, but, after one poignant look from Millie, Louise decided to head immediately for her cabin. She lingered in the staff building only long enough to send Tina the password she'd promised — _B00b00st3r_ — before she headed out, deciding she was overdue for a shower.  
  
There were three stalls in the cabin bathroom, but only one mirror and one toilet, which she imagined would quickly become a nightmare in the mornings once the campers arrived. She gave the cabin a walk-around, making sure she was completely alone, before she removed her hat to brush out her hair and step into the shower.  
  
She had just finished drying her hair and had just put her hat back on her head when the door swung open. Jessica strode in with a tennis racquet over her shoulder. "The rec hall's pretty great," was the first thing she said. "Do you play any sports? A lot of the other girls are pretty competitive."  
  
"Hell no," said Louise. "Unless they have a NASCAR-style track set up in there."  
  
Jessica set the racquet down over the sink. "No," she said. "By the way, Millie's apparently a tennis superstar."  
  
Louise rolled her eyes, trying not to think about Millie and whatever she was doing right now. She was probably plotting something evil. "I didn't know you played tennis either," she said to shift the subject, before belatedly realizing just what a stupid thing it was to say. Of course she couldn't know that Jessica played tennis. There were a lot of things she didn't know about Jessica. It had been years since they'd last seen each other, and she'd just run into her again this morning.  
  
But if Jessica found the comment to be as stupid as it was, she said nothing. She just nodded. "Well, yeah. Tennis, and golf, and horseback riding, and whatever else my parents want me to do."  
  
Louise suddenly recalled a memorable factoid about Jessica's family. They were wealthy. She tried to recall what it was they did. Osteo-something. "What was it your parents do for a living? They've got osteoporosis?"  
  
"They're osteopaths," said Jessica, her mouth twitching.  
  
"Whoa. They're _psychic?_ " Louise asked dramatically.  
  
"No!" Jessica laughed. "It's... it's pretty much quack medicine, honestly. They know it, too."  
  
"Yeah," said Louise, trying to recall what she knew of it. "Like, it's zen natural healing stuff, right? Glorified massage therapy?"  
  
"More or less," said Jessica. "That's actually why we moved. They started a new practice. It brought a lot of money in. There's a lot of hippies up in Wellington, I guess."  
  
So that was why. She just remembered that one day Jessica had just left, but not why. There had been little warning. She couldn't even remember when or how she'd learned it; she couldn't even remember saying goodbye. She'd just moved one day, and Louise hadn't thought about her much after that. "And you guys are still living there?" she asked after a pause.  
  
Jessica nodded. "It's actually a nice place," she said, "if you like eating vegan."  
  
Something did not make sense. "Hold on," said Louise. "If your family's rich, what the hell are you doing here?" She hadn't yet asked Jessica at all just what had brought her to the Thundergirls Summer Camp in the first place. "I mean, _my_ family's always in a perpetual state of barely scraping by, so, you know, I kinda need the money. But _you_?"  
  
"Are you kidding? They make me work for everything," said Jessica. "I mean _everything._ Even if it's something like wanting a new notebook for school, I have to buy it with my own money. They say it builds character."  
  
"So that's what was going on with your résumé," said Louise, thinking back to Jessica's folder in Ginny's office. Wait. Shit, she shouldn't have said that.  
  
"How did you manage to read my résumé?" Jessica asked in a somewhat affronted tone.  
  
"Uh," said Louise. "I may have broken into Ginny's office earlier today. Well, I mean, I didn't really _break in_. It was unlocked, so it was pretty much fair game." Then she quickly added: "I didn't break in just to read your file. Your file just happened to be one of the ones I looked at."  
  
Jessica scrunched up her face. "Well, that's embarrassing," she said. "It says shit like, _I'm a meticulous high achiever_."  
  
"Aren't you?"  
  
"My mom proofread and edited it," said Jessica. "So, no." And then she walked towards the bathroom. "By the way, I excuse the privacy violation."  
  
"Uncalled for, but thank you," said Louise politely.  
  
Later, at precisely eleven, there was a distant blare of static, followed by Ginny's voice echoing straight through the walls. The loudspeaker announcement declared that it was curfew time and that everyone was expected to be in their cabins and going to sleep. It soon faded away. Louise suddenly badly missed her room-slash-closet, with its soundproof walls and comforting claustrophobia. She groped over the side of her bed and felt for her phone. She pulled up Tina's e-mail and eventually fell asleep staring at it.

  


•

  


The next day saw everyone piled back into the classroom inside of the staff building. Louise forced herself to socialize and begin learning the names of the other girls. The great majority of them had been Thundergirls since childhood, and almost all of them were thrilled to be camp staff. They were surprised when Louise informed them that her only experience with the organization was less than a week's worth spread across two troops, one of which she had betrayed.  
  
She expected that they would return to reviewing standards and regulations after the second first aid examination, and so she was surprised when Ginny announced, "We will spend the rest of our day doing team building exercises. Campers will be arriving around dinnertime. Until then, we'll be learning to interact as a unit."  
  
That idea didn't seem so bad until Louise realized just what exactly these exercises would entail. Most of them were games that involved name memorization and communication and stereotypes. Ginny had instructed all of them to sign up for at least one. None of them looked appealing until she saw Capture the Flag listed. Relieved, she checked her name off under it, only to watch Millie promptly sign up afterwards with a big, bright smile. Louise froze in horror, but soon Jessica was writing her name down, as well. She resolved that she would have to find a way to make Jessica hate Millie as much as she hated Millie.  
  
In the end, only six out of the ten pairs had signed up for Capture the Flag, which meant that there would be six per team. It was already late in the afternoon, with just a couple of hours remaining until dinnertime. Louise waited with dread as Ginny recounted the rules and then decided the teams, holding the silk scarves meant to differentiate the teams in both hands. She couldn't decide what would be worse: having Millie on her team, or having to play against her.  
  
"The Yellow team will be Moon, Lightning, and Star cabins." Louise already knew what was coming by the time Ginny finished, "The Purple team will be Twinkle, Raindrop, and Sparkle cabins."  
  
" _LOUISE_ ," sang an overjoyed voice from her left. Millie sidled up to her, knotting a purple scarf around her throat. Louise suppressed the urge to grab both ends and start strangling her with it. "We're on the same team! You and me, just like old times!"  
  
Louise threw her arms into the air. "We were never on the same team, Millie. Never! Never, ever, _ever._ "  
  
"Oh, Louise!" said Millie warmly. "Shhh, Louise! This is all about working together." And she pressed a scarf into Louise's hand.  
  
Jessica wandered back from claiming her scarf. She had sensibly tied it around one wrist. She looked at Millie. "Hope you're as good at this as you are at tennis," she said plainly.  
  
Louise stuck her scarf through her belt loops. "Oh, she's _very_ good at games of sneakiness and deception," she said, unable to resist commenting in the most bitter voice she could manage.  
  
"Aw, Louise!" Millie grinned, rocking on her heels. She looked like she was going to say something else, but then she just beckoned the rest of the team over. They agreed that they would place their flag in a tree. It wasn't explicitly against the rules, even if it was a little unfair, but, as one of the Raindrop Cabin girls pointed out, they were playing in the forest, and putting the flag up in a tree would make it more visible. The teams split up and traipsed off to their respective team territories. Louise was immediately accosted by mosquitoes as they walked through the brush.  
  
"Don't you think that maybe playing in a forest none of us are really familiar with is a bad idea," Louise finally said as they worked to place their flag up in their selected tree, swatting away a mosquito on her arm.  
  
"Yes," said Jessica, while at the same time Millie said, "No."  
  
There was a distant whistle blast, which they took to mean that the game had begun. They all stared at one another uncertainly, except for Millie, who immediately proposed a strategy: "Well, obviously we need at least one person to stay behind to defend our territory. The rest of us can head over in their direction! Slow and steady. Like spies! We can even pair up! I'll go with Louise."  
  
"No thank you," said Louise immediately. "I'll stay behind and defend the tree, thanks." It wasn't as exciting as getting in on the action, but she definitely didn't want to be sneaking through the forest with Millie at her side.  
  
"Me, too," Jessica said unexpectedly. "I think four is enough for offense, and two is fair for defense."  
  
Millie looked annoyed, but then just as soon she was smiling. "That's great of you, Louise! I'm sure you'll do an amazing job. Let's get going." She and the three other girls hashed out which directions they planned to go, and then they were off. Louise watched Millie's back until he had totally disappeared in the brush. She let out a breath she didn't realize she was holding.  
  
"Thanks," she said, turning to Jessica. She waved away another mosquito.  
  
Jessica shrugged it off. "I wasn't planning on just sitting around given all the bugs, but it's probably better than running around while Millie yells orders."  
  
"Yeah," said Louise glumly. "I kind of wanted to play offense, though." She sat on a tree stump, reaching up to adjust her hat.  
  
"Well, we can. It's not like we promised to stay here. If no one shows up in ten or fifteen minutes we can just head out, too. I think that's fair," said Jessica, taking a place leaning against the tree that held their team's flag.  
  
Louise decided that she liked that plan, and nodded her agreement. She pulled out her phone to keep time. The minutes passed without so much as a rustle from the bushes. "I bet they're all lost," she said eventually. "Or they're all beating the shit out of one another by the Yellow team base."  
  
"Let's head over, then," said Jessica, straightening. Louise rose to her feet to join her. Nearly twenty minutes had passed, and Louise was no longer sure of what direction their teammates had chosen to go. The surroundings all looked more or less the same; it was trees in all directions. Eventually they picked the trail they thought they had initially come from. Louise was feeling pretty good about their choice, fairly certain that it would lead them back to the midway point between the two team territories. It didn't.  
  


•

  


An hour and a half had passed when Louise finally allowed the horror to settle in. "We're lost," she said.  
  
"Yeah," said Jessica.  
  
The forest was stifling hot, and Louise wished she'd brought a water bottle. Or a compass. Or a GPS system, because she didn't know how to use a compass. Her head hurt. Her stomach felt like it was about to start eating itself. She wondered if perhaps she was displaying symptoms of heat exhaustion. She was stumbling slightly as she followed Jessica, who was holding herself together admirably.  
  
"It's actually dinnertime now, isn't it," Louise panted. "The campers are arriving right now, and Ginny's probably about to send out a search party because we're not there to greet them."  
  
Jessica's brows knit together, and she nodded. She was silent for the next ten minutes, unusually serious about guiding their directionless way through the forest. Louise considered telling her that perhaps they ought to switch up leadership duties, but her stomach was lurching and she'd run out of stamina.  
  
Eventually, they heard the distant hum of voices. Both of them paused to listen, trying to figure out what direction it was coming from. Louise decided that she had had enough of being lost, and so she used the last of her energy to take off at a run for it. "If I have to be here for even one more minute I might actually die," she announced, and then she dashed off in the direction she thought the voices were coming from.  
  
"Louise!" Jessica called out. "Wait up!"  
  
But Louise was too desperate to get back to civilization, and also some stomach medicine, to listen. She shoved a large tree branch out of her way, and in the moment after doing so realized what a terrible idea that was. She turned just time to watch the branch go snapping right back into Jessica. It seemed to happen in slow motion; it would have been hilarious if she were in a better mood, or if Jessica didn't go staggering back, red suddenly dripping down her arm.  
  
"Ow," she said in a very flat voice. She held up her arm. Her elbow had a significant gash in it and it was bleeding freely. Louise stared at it, feeling even more nauseous, and remembered one of Tina's bullet points— something about documenting all injuries.  
  
"That sure is a gaping wound," she managed.  
  
"Don't worry about it," Jessica said, clenching her arm tight. Louise was stunned at how unaffected she was, and she opened her mouth to say something else, to apologize, but she was interrupted. "Look, we're almost there. Let's go." She jerked her chin up. Louise looked. They had broken through the trees, and were gazing back onto the campgrounds. There were several charter buses parked right outside of the mess hall, and the area was a chaotic scene of luggage, bustling staff members, and excited little girls. They were all grouped off into what Louise assumed were cabin groups, mostly because there was one group in particular that lacked a pair of counselors standing by. That had to be theirs.  
  
Louise knew she had to make a good impression, but as she and Jessica stepped out from the brush, covered in mosquito bites, with Jessica bleeding and herself pale and nauseated, she knew they were already doomed. Ginny spotted them and rushed over.  
  
"What _happened_ to you both?!" she cried in her most stress-filled voice yet.  
  
Jessica waved her hands. "We got lost. It's okay, though." Ginny flinched away from her right hand, which was covered in blood. "Where are, uh, our campers?"  
  
"Over there," said Ginny, pointing to the one group without attending staff members. "We're about to all settle in for dinner, but you really should be coming up to the first aid stat—"  
  
Louise was only half-listening to this conversation, distracted by the queasiness she felt. She was only alerted back to reality when Jessica gave her a push and marched over to the group Ginny had indicated. Louise stared at them dully, counting: eight in all.  
  
"It's great to meet all of you little people," huffed Jessica, clapping a hand over her elbow. Blood spurted out from between her fingers.  
  
"Are you bleeding?!" one of the girls cried shrilly. The rest shrunk back.  
  
"Uh, yes," said Jessica authoritatively. "That's really not a big deal, though. We can worry about that later. I'm Jessica, and—"  
  
It was too much. The continuing sight of the blood sent Louise over the edge. Typically, she prided herself on having a particularly strong stomach— it was a necessity growing up, given Gene's frequent acts of gastrointestinal terrorism. But now, standing under the hot sun, exhausted after nearly two hours of wandering around in the forest, and watching Jessica unsuccessfully try to staunch the wound on her arm, it was too much. "Hold that thought," Louise proclaimed, before tipping over to retch between her knees.  
  
Behind them, Ginny stood with fingers on both temples, as if, with enough concentration, she might be able to summon a psychic blast strong enough to wipe away the counselors of Twinkle Cabin.  
  
"And that's Louise," Jessica finished to the stunned and appalled campers, reaching over to pat her on the back.


	3. my own number one

Louise wondered if she would be paid for the time she was spending in the infirmary. This concern had occupied her thoughts since the very moment Ginny had gripped her with one hand and Jessica with another and marched them both down to the staff building. Louise began to feel like she had been in there a lot lately. Although she had been told to lie down, she sat stubbornly up on the thin foam mattress, waiting to receive the all-clear that would let her out.  
  
She didn't _feel_ sick. As embarrassing as it had been to do it in front of so many people, throwing up had cleared up her condition a great deal, and it felt as though just being out of the hot sun had more or less cured her. Ginny's assistant, a brown-skinned woman who looked to be fresh out of college, had assessed Louise thoroughly and declared her to be mostly alright, but insisted that she remain in the infirmary for another hour or two. So here she was, in the infirmary. Louise hated being sick, and she hated being tended to even more. Visits to the doctor and dentist had been a personal nightmare for as long as she could remember.  
  
The handle turned as Louise was thinking about how she'd approach Ginny on the subject of her paycheck. Jessica stood there, a sheaf of papers clutched in one hand. Her other arm hung at her side. Louise observed a great quantity of white gauze wrapped around the elbow.  
  
She cringed, but because Louise Belcher was never one to admit that she ever felt bad about anything, she said, "So they didn't have to cut it off?"  
  
Jessica didn't seem perturbed, even though the injury had been Louise's fault. "Nope," she said easily, pulling out the chair that was propped against the wall and dropping into it across from Louise's cot. "Stitches. I'm thinking about suing you. Call the family attorney, maybe." She thumbed through the papers, separated one stapled section, and held it out to Louise. "Here. It's liability stuff."  
  
"Uh," said Louise, taking them. She looked up at Jessica, startled. "You're actually going to sue me? You remember my family, right? How we actually have to live in our restaurant?"  
  
"No!" Jessica started laughing. Her monotone voice gave way to a warm trill that made Louise feel embarrassed somehow. "Look at your face. Wow. No, this stuff's for Ginny. I got hurt, and you got sick. We have to fill it out for her files."  
  
Right. The rule about documenting accidents and injuries. "I didn't think you were actually going to sue," Louise bluffed, and then she looked down at the papers. Her eyes glazed over immediately, and she decided that she would fill out the incident report later, or maybe never. She set it aside. "Sorry," she said finally, staring at the puffy bandage encircling Jessica's elbow. "I was sort of desperate to get out of there."  
  
"Whatever," said Jessica dismissively. "We _were_ wandering around there for a while. I'm pretty much an awful navigator. I'm surprised you didn't call me out in there."  
  
"I think I was in denial about being lost," said Louise, frowning. "Hey, If your wound goes all necrotic out here, I'll finish the job and just cut your arm off for you."  
  
"It's not a zombie bite," Jessica said. "But thanks." Her gaze flicked up to the small window. "When do you get out of here? We're already behind on schedule, and it's not even the end of day two." Louise noticed that one of the papers in her stack was an activity chart and schedule. Well, at least one of them was keeping track of it.  
  
"Whenever — uh — what's Ginny's assistant's name? Amber? Whenever Amber says it's okay," said Louise. "I think she's worried I'll start puking everywhere again."  
  
"Have you got anything left in there? That sure was something," Jessica noted with a grave expression. Louise couldn't tell if she was concerned or teasing.  
  
"I don't know," she said, settling on 'teasing'. She pressed her hands to her stomach. "Feels pretty empty."  
  
Jessica smiled. "Well, you scared the shit out of our campers. I think Ginny's got them now. I feel kind of bad. We really should be out there with all the other cabins."  
  
"I don't," Louise immediately said, decisively. "Look, the longer I go without beginning three-week babysitting duty, the better."  
  
"I hear that." Jessica sighed, then she looked at Louise— specifically, at the top of her head. "You'd probably recover faster if you took your hat off. That's probably what made you so sick out there in the heat."  
  
Louise's hands flew up to the top of her rabbit ears, immediately defensive, even though Jessica's hands were nowhere near her head. "No," she said, and she hoped that would be the end of the suggestion. "No exceptions, Wallpaper."  
  
"You really do wear it all the time?" asked Jessica instead of commenting on the new nickname.  
  
"Let's just say," Louise said, "you don't want to know what goes down when I _haven't_ got it on."  
  
Jessica looked at her, and then she said, "I'm going to find out what the top of your head looks like one day." One arm was folded across her chest. The other thoughtfully rested at her chin. She looked like someone who had made up her mind. This embarrassed Louise more than the laugh from earlier had. It was a strange feeling, and, like all strange, unfamiliar feelings, Louise hated it and wanted to find a way to oust it from her thoughts immediately.  
  
Whenever Louise was uncomfortable, she got defensive, and here, sarcasm was her strongest weapon. "Good luck," she said, snorting through her nose. "That is literally never going to happen. And let me tell you that this is a pretty serious thing for me to say, because _no one_ hates the overuse of the word 'literally' more than I do. But here I mean it. It will never happen."  
  
"Want to make it a bet?" asked Jessica calmly, undeterred. "By the end of these three weeks, you'll take off your hat in front of me. A hundred dollars."  
  
"That," said Louise, "is like asking me to take off my underwear in front of you."  
  
Jessica grinned, and for a moment Louise thought — her guts squirming — that she had unwittingly set up the perfect lead-in to an inappropriate joke. Maybe 'underwear' had been a poor choice of words. But all Jessica said was, "Come on, Louise. Is it a bet or not?"  
  
The way she asked made Louise flare up a little; she had always found it difficult to turn down any challenge, a trait that had gotten her into a great deal of trouble, over and over, in her life. This would be no exception. She drew herself up and squared her shoulders. She was fairly confident that she would never encounter a scenario here at the Thundergirls Summer Camp that would convince her to take her hat off in front of Jessica, which was what made it feel safe to say, "Fine. A hundred bucks is a hundred bucks. Sucks to be you, man."  
  
A hand reached out for her. Louise stared at it, before realizing that Jessica intended to shake on it. She mumbled something about how it felt juvenile, but she did, locking her hand against Jessica's and clasping it. Jessica's handshake was firm and left her palm feeling cramped in on itself. She willed herself not to shake the appendage as she drew it back.  
  
"Great," said Jessica cheerfully.  
  
"Can't you go back to being tap water," complained Louise, feeling put out by how Jessica had so easily dismantled her bravado, "instead of pulling this stuff out on me?"  
  
"I'll think about it," said Jessica.  
  
At that moment, Amber stuck her head through the door. "You should be alright to leave," she said. "I'd like it if you could stay here so I could observe you, but Ginny needs you both."  
  
Louise swung her legs over the side of the cot and stood immediately. "Holy shit, finally," she said. When Amber stared in the same disapproving manner Ginny had adopted for her, she corrected: "I mean, thanks." She looked to Jessica. "Hey, let's go. What's first on that little schedule of yours?"  
  
Jessica held it up. "Thirteen smile hike," she said.

  


•

 

At first, Louise had taken the phrase to be a joke. But a thirteen smile hike was exactly what it sounded like. It was the first activity listed on the schedule, meant to help the campers and their counselors get to know one another. Because of the time the counselors of Twinkle Cabin had spent in the infirmary, they were getting started an hour and a half later than every other cabin. It was already seven-thirty; the sun had begun its descent.  
  
"Okay, so this kind of seems like a terrible idea?" she muttered to Jessica under her breath as she counted out the eight heads of the campers for what felt like the twentieth time. "Us out in the dark with these kids? I can't read a compass, by the way, so I hope you can."  
  
"I can't," said Jessica. "But it's a thirteen _smile_ hike. It shouldn't take us more than an hour." She reached over and plucked Louise's Official Thundergirls Camp Counselor Manual out of the side pocket on her backpack and then flipped through to the map of the campgrounds. "We're walking a trail that's already marked. There's thirteen points we're supposed to stop at and, oh, I don't know, learn something about the forest, I guess."  
  
Although the fact that the path was marked was somewhat comforting, Louise remained uneasy. She wished Tina were around to dispel useless but informative facts about the mating habits of squirrels, or whatever. "Okay," she said, looking again to the campers.  
  
Eight pairs of eyes stared back at her. "What was your name again?" one of the girls asked her, while another chimed in with, "What's your favorite thing about being in the Thundergirls? Mine is—"  
  
"Louise," she interrupted. "And I'm not a Thundergirl, so, question disqualified." That seemed to puzzle them; the children exchanged looks, then turned their attentions to Jessica, whom they'd all seemed to warm up to much more quickly.  
  
"What about yours!"  
  
"Do you like arts and crafts?"  
  
"When will we get to swim in the lake?"  
  
Jessica didn't look up from the map as she answered. "My favorite thing is the Thundergirls cookies. My family buys them up like crazy. Yes, I like arts and crafts. We will get to swim in the lake at the end of the hike."  
  
That was news to Louise. "We have to swim in that thing?" she asked, disgusted. She tried to keep her voice low. It wasn't like she was particularly concerned about the girls overhearing her, but she didn't want to invite a whole new round of questions.  
  
"It's the thirteenth, uh, smile," said Jessica. "Apparently."  
  
The girls were beginning to get restless, prodding at one another, digging through their backpacks. Louise tried to recall their names. The one with thick, dark curls who had asked her her name was... Violet, maybe? The one behind her with the crooked glasses was Penelope, and next to her was Lucia. The girl with freckles over every visible inch of her skin was London, or Paris, or Shanghai, or some other name that designated her as a city. Louise couldn't remember. She drew a blank on the remaining four.  
  
"Okay, uh, Penelope, and Violet..." she tried slowly. The two she'd guessed the names on looked up at her. So far, so good. "We're all going to pair up before we head out." That seemed like a good, responsible idea. "The two of you together."  
  
Jessica picked up on the plan immediately. "Right," she said, before promptly taking over the rest of the pairings. She had apparently made a greater effort to memorize the names of the campers; Louise tried to commit them to memory. The one with the name of a city was Sydney. The remaining four were Marie, June, Anna, and Georgia. Louise was certain that she would forget all of them within the next fifteen minutes.  
  
They were a diverse group of children, irritating in the typical way Louise had come to expect of kids — yes, she had been one, she often informed her mother, but not by choice — but they seemed to get along decently as a group, and they settled into uneventful but happy chatter as Jessica led the way down the marked path. Louise stomped after her, none too happy to be right back in the forest they'd gotten lost in hours ago. Jessica seemed to be comfortable leading, and Louise quickly realized what the name of the hike meant. The first stopping point was at a sign hammered to a tree, informing the group of exciting tidbits like _The Northern Red Oak is our state tree_ and _Gypsy moths threaten the population of the Red Oak_. Louise couldn't figure out where the 'smile' part would come into play in the 'thirteen smile hike' concept, so she just decided to frown the whole way.  
  
Stopping points two through seven were equally unexciting, and they were brought to a halt at stopping point eight when the girls decided, as a group, that they wanted to collect acorns. After checking her phone for the time, Jessica decided that they could allow for five minutes. Louise groaned, wanting to hurry to point thirteen — the lake — to get the hike over and done with. They sat on a log and watched the girls scatter around, kneeling and dragging their fingers over the ground for acorns. Louise dug through her backpack for her water bottle.  
  
"It'll be dark by the time we get to the lake," she said, not attempting to hide her displeasure. "Just saying."  
  
"Yeah, but have you noticed?" Jessica pointed to the children, who were still within eyesight (Louise kept counting heads). "They're having fun."  
  
"Warms my heart," said Louise flatly, tipping her head back to drink.  
  
A voice then cut through the brush, shrill and completely unmistakable.  
  
"When I say _Lou!_ "  
  
Louise coughed, water spraying out of her mouth, and ducked her head, but in the next second two tanned legs were in front of her, and a hand was tying the rabbit ears atop her head into a bow. She kicked out instinctively at Millie's shins, aiming for her kneecaps, but her target danced out of the way, laughing. Louise's hands flew up to her head to undo the knot Millie had deftly managed to tie. When she looked up, she saw Millie smiling down at her and Jessica. Louise stood, because she was not about to let Millie enjoy lording above her.  
  
"Hey!" enthused Millie. "I heard you got sick earlier. I was so worried about you, _I_ almost got sick! Sympathy pains, you know? It can happen when two people are _really_ close."  
  
"We," began Louise, her entire face twitching, "are. _Not._ Clo—"  
  
Beside her, still sitting, Jessica spoke boredly. "What are you doing here? Where's your cabin?"  
  
_Good question_ , Louise thought. Millie had turned to Jessica, looking at her as though she'd just noticed that she was there. "Oh! Sparkle's just running a little behind. Which point are you at? Eight? We just reached nine, so our cabins can totally finish the hike together!"  
  
Louise looked around. Towards her left, another group moved in the shadows. As they came closer, she recognized Millie's co-counselor, flanked by a group of eight little girls. Louise felt bad for Millie's co-counselor, a willowy girl with a long, fretful face who had remained completely silent in her presence earlier at Capture the Flag. Millie was petite and looked unimposing with her round face and halo of blonde hair, but Louise knew better, and she wouldn't agree to share a cabin with her for anything in the world. She couldn't imagine what the next three weeks would be like for that girl.  
  
"I don't think we want to," said Louise as firmly as she could manage. "Twinkle Cabin is kind of doing its own thing."  
  
"Penelope!" yelled one of the girls from Millie's cabin, and Louise felt the last of her hopes trickle away as she watched her campers mingle with Millie's. They had unknowingly sealed her fate. She resolved to withhold their bedtime snacks.  
  
Jessica stood up, slipping her backpack in place on her shoulders. "There's just a few more," she said, looking at Millie, but Louise had a feeling that she was speaking to her instead. The reminder that she would not have to endure too much with Millie was reassuring enough that she could put up with it until they broke out of the forest.  
  
As they set back off on their way towards the tenth stopping point, Millie slid up beside Louise. Both of Millie's arms wove strongly around one of hers as they walked. Louise immediately began trying to shake free, but Millie held fast, and the alarmed looks the campers were giving them forced her to stop the struggle. She put her best effort into driving her elbow as sharply as she could into Millie's ribs as she was dragged along.  
  
"I was thinking," began Millie.  
  
" _Really?_ " Louise gasped, putting on her best surprised face. "Well, don't _hurt_ yourself, Millie, don't get all burned out _thinking!_ "  
  
"About our broken friendship," continued Millie, undeterred.  
  
"I wish you'd stop calling it a friendship," said Louise as calmly as she could. She watched Jessica's back; her co-counselor was leading the group a few steps ahead of them all. Louise wondered if her ears were perked to the conversation happening behind her.  
  
"We've just never gotten along the way I wish we could." Millie looked at her sideways, her already huge, twitchy eyes looking huger and twitchier.  
  
"You make it very hard," Louise said, making another attempt at freeing her arm. Millie's fingernails dug sharply into her bicep, putting an end to that.  
  
There was a deep frown on Millie's face. It was familiar to Louise, and she did not like the look of it. "You know, Louise, you're such a funny, funny, _funny_ bunny. 'Cause I remember that we stopped talking because of something _you_ did."  
  
Great. So Millie remembered the incident at Andy and Ollie's sixteenth birthday party just as clearly as she did. Louise nearly tripped over a root in the ground, and brought the both of them to a halt to kick it out of the way. "You pushed me there, Millie," she said, although she knew there was no way she could phrase her side of things that would make it seem fair. "And by the way, I think the year in which we haven't been talking has been kind of good for the both of us."  
  
"You called me a 'fucking psycho bitch' in front of half the people in our grade." Millie's voice was syrupy and girlish, curling up into Louise's ear even through the protective covering of her hat.  
  
Ahead of them Jessica's head turned slightly, but she didn't slow her steps. Louise wished she'd interfere with the conversation.  
  
"Yeah," she said, finally, because Millie wasn't wrong. She had nothing else to say. What she really wanted to ask was what the hell Millie wanted of her now. If plain psychological torture was her goal, she would have an easy time of it here within the stuffy boundaries of the camp that she would be unable to leave for the next three weeks.  
  
"Like I said, though, I forgive you." Millie put her head on Louise's shoulder, briefly. Louise cringed. Millie straightened, but didn't let go of her arm. "Okay, so! Moving on. I was thinking earlier. New idea: we form a rap duo, you and I."  
  
Louise ground her teeth together.

  


•

 

Louise was immensely relieved when they reached the thirteenth point, the lake. It was only when they got there that Millie finally let go of her arm and charged ahead with her own cabin, shucking off her uniform as she went to reveal the swimsuit she'd worn underneath. The campgrounds hugged the lake all the way around, but the point marked on the map brought them to a small, untended beach with an equally neglected dock. 'Beach' was perhaps too kind a term for it; the shore was rocky and covered in debris from the lake. By the dock, colorful canoes with the Thundergirls emblem were moored.  
  
Throwing her backpack down onto the rocky sand, Louise took a look around. The sun had begun to dip into the horizon, coloring the lake a searing gold. She watched as the girls in her cabin and Millie's went to splash around in the shallow water, staying close to the shore. Louise had no plans to join in; she hadn't worn a swimsuit, and, besides, she was sort of disgusted by the idea of venturing into the water. But the campers seemed to be having fun, and it was a relief to be distanced from their high-pitched chatter, so Louise counted her blessings.  
  
A backpack thudded into the sand beside her. Louise looked up. Jessica stood there. She still wore the unflattering taupe shorts of the uniform, but she had removed her shirt to expose the one-piece swimsuit she'd worn beneath. "You're not going in?" she asked.  
  
"I didn't wear a swimsuit," said Louise. "Also, fuck no, in general."  
  
Jessica smiled. She had made to remove her shorts, but now she withdrew her hands and dropped to the sand beside Louise. "I heard Millie running her mouth the whole way here," she said, stretching out her long legs. "There's something weird going on with the two of you."  
  
Louise recoiled defensively, appalled. "Look, if you're going to say that Millie Frock is in love with me, _believe me_ , I've considered the possibility. I have concluded that she's not. She's just crazy." She wasn't lying. Gene had made a very big deal about the theory, and Louise had horrified herself enough on her own with the idea that Millie held some deep seated romantic longing for her before deciding that, for the sake of her own sanity, it could not possibly be true.  
  
"Okay. You act really differently around her, though." Jessica raked a hand through the sand, laughing. "It's like you're miserable soulmates."  
  
The betrayal Louise felt probably showed on her face, because Jessica's laughter only increased in intensity. Her plan of finding a way to make Jessica hate Millie as much as she hated Millie seemed to not be coming along as smoothly as she'd hoped, and the fact that she was now on the receiving end of this kind of teasing did not please her. Feeling agitated, the only thing she could think of to reply with was a rattled, "I'm not signed up for the soulmate thing."  
  
"No?" Jessica drew her knees up to her chest.  
  
"Too selfish," said Louise, her expression souring. "I mean, I kind of like it that way. Being my own number one."  
  
"You're really strange, Louise," said Jessica, and although it was in her usual toneless voice, it did not seem like a mean thing to say.  
  
Louise stared out across the lake instead of replying. The sun had halved behind it, a sliver of blinding bright against the treeline. The water scorched with its light, glowing like one huge ember. Suddenly, she missed the restaurant. She wished she were watching the sun set through its windows instead, or from her favorite spot on the pier. She wasn't even three days into her time at the camp; suddenly everything seemed to be moving very slowly, and she remembered her father's comments about homesickness. _Great_ , she thought, swallowing the knot in her throat.  
  
"My sister's all about that, though," she said, the words bursting out of her before she could really think about them. "Finding a soulmate, like... That ever-after shit. _Gross_ , right?" It was a good enough distraction from the faint nausea that had rolled through her.  
  
Jessica took a moment to reply. Louise wondered why; she wasn't willing to look over at her just yet, worried that somehow Jessica might have picked up on her moment of weakness. "I remember Tina," Jessica said finally, as if she'd noticed nothing at all. "And Gene. How's your family doing, anyway?"  
  
"Still at the same dump on Ocean Avenue," said Louise. "Tina's finishing up an English lit major with a focus on feminist theory. She's still after the same boy she's been with, for, like, forever. Gene just graduated high school, and I think he's running away to Thailand in August. He hasn't even told our parents."  
  
"What about you?" Jessica asked. "One more year of high school. Any plans?"  
  
"Well," said Louise, and that was all she had to say at first, because, no, she hadn't really thought about it at all. University or college had never really seemed like the end game for her. "I was just going to play it by ear." When she said this, Jessica reached up to flick one of Louise's rabbit ears. Louise swatted her hand away, grinning. "Well, what about you, with your super fancy résumé and tennis skills? You're probably in at some Ivy League school already, right?"  
  
Jessica sighed, the burst of playfulness fading out of her. She stared at the darkening sky. "Yeah. You're mostly right, actually. I've got early admission at Harvard."  
  
Louise puzzled over what that meant, before taking a guess based on what she knew about Tina's college experience. "That means, uh, you're in based on grades or whatever, but you don't have to go if you change your mind— right?"  
  
"Yeah," said Jessica, and there was something listless about the look on her face, the way the gleam sank out of her eyes. "Well, that's what they want. Everything's what they want."  
  
Feeling slightly uncomfortable, Louise prompted, "Your parents?" She understood that not everyone had been raised by a pair of people as lenient as her own mother and father. Despite their quirks, they had always encouraged Louise and her siblings to pursue their individual passions and interests, and at the end of the day, she could always count on their support. She was immensely grateful for them, although it would take a lot to get her to admit it. Still, she had always known that Bob and Linda weren't like most parents out there.  
  
"We don't really get along," said Jessica calmly, in a voice that didn't really invite questions, but Louise had none to ask — at least none that felt appropriate, given that she was just coming to know Jessica again — so she remained silent.  
  
She decided to change the subject; Jessica seemed happy to comply. "Why aren't you going swimming?" Louise asked her suddenly, realizing that she was still halfway undressed to her swimsuit. But instead of heading into the lake with everyone else, here Jessica was sitting on the beach with her.  
  
The sun had disappeared below the far end of the lake. Far into the water, Millie stood waist-deep, and Louise could see her turn towards the shore. She lifted her arm and waved at Louise, who didn't return it. The gradient of the sky began to melt into an inky purple far above their heads, and she was little more than a silhouette. Louise was still staring at her when the girl beside her spoke. "You were just sitting here all alone," said Jessica.  
  
Louise expected her to elaborate, but she didn't. She was glad that the changing light hid the color on her cheeks. 

  


•

 

Things around camp had become so eventful, so suddenly, that Louise barely remembered the first official full day with her campers. For one, getting up at eight in the morning was a cruel torture, and she had remained barely conscious throughout the duration of breakfast; she hadn't properly woken up until well into lunch, and by then they were going from activity to activity, Jessica often leading the charge. Louise felt bad for pushing the organizational aspects onto her, but Jessica seemed to thrive under the role. By the end of the day, Louise's fingers were cramped from weaving bracelets — the one skill she held over Jessica's head — and she was eager for the downtime allotted for the evening.  
  
Yesterday's thirteen smile hike had ended when it had become well and truly dark. Millie had made sure to drip lake water all over Louise's backpack on their way out, but otherwise, she had escaped relatively unscathed, and she hadn't seen Millie all day apart from meal times. Louise liked that the constant flow of events in the schedule kept Millie's cabin just as busy as hers, but it was utterly exhausting. She had never had to work this hard at the restaurant, where running the cash register was a breeze and second nature to her. Here, she was expected to juggle a million different tasks at once while keeping her eyes on eight little girls. They had chattered well into the night in the tiny cabin, and Louise had not slept very well. She was keen to use her free time to relax. She was heading over to the recreational hall when Ginny caught her.  
  
"Miss Belcher," said Ginny lightly, looking at her with a tight-lipped but — at least Louise thought — friendly expression. "How was your first official day? I haven't heard about any accidents from you or Miss Sievers, so I've got my fingers crossed that your track record started and ended yesterday."  
  
Louise grinned at her. "It wasn't so bad," she said breezily. "Really, I—"  
  
"Hold on," said Ginny abruptly, all friendliness fading in favor of worry. "What is that?"  
  
She was staring right into Louise's face. Louise felt as though she should know what she was talking about, but she had no idea. "I'm sorry?" she said, turning and looking over her shoulder, wondering if maybe a bee had landed on her head.  
  
"You have your nose pierced," said Ginny in a tone of great stress, "like a bull."  
  
_Shit_ , Louise thought. Her hand flew up to her nose, where her septum ring had flipped back out. She jammed it back up there while Ginny's face contorted (in alarm and/or disgust, she couldn't decide which). "It's usually way up there!" she said in her most casual voice. "There. See? It's gone." She removed her hand and wiggled her nose like a rabbit at the camp director, who did not look happy to see her impression.  
  
"If you have any tattoos, or other dress code violations to reveal, now would be a great time," said Ginny.  
  
Louise thought about the little pattern poked into her thigh from one incredibly insane, poorly made decision a year ago when she and Gene had split a bottle of rum and followed what was probably a very unsafe home tattooing tutorial. Gene had drawn the world's ugliest Kuchi Kopi on her leg, and she had given him the chords to the chorus of Funkytown on his foot. When their mother had found out, she had signed them both up for a kids-in-crisis seminar, only to pull them out within the first hour. Bob made them both promise to get their tattoos covered up once they were of age, reasoning that since they had already done something that would be around permanently, ' _It might as well not look like you got it done in prison_ '. Gene had countered that Bob would need to get his covered up, too. It would be a family event when Louise turned eighteen. She looked forward to it.  
  
"Nope," she said finally, deciding that she wasn't about to show off her unfortunate tattoo at any time, and thus she wouldn't need to confess to its existence.  
  
"Good," Ginny muttered. "Well, I have a lot to do today. I'll see you around. By the way, please try to have your incident report in to me by tomorrow."  
  
Right. Louise had yet to complete it. None of her plans for the evening included filling out forms, but she nodded, if only to get Ginny off of her back for now. This seemed to satisfy the camp director, who was then on her way. Louise started back off toward the recreational hall. As she neared it, something thunked into the side of her head.  
  
It wasn't heavy, so it didn't hurt. Louise whirled, trying to see the source, but there was no one in sight. Her eyes dropped to a crumpled ball of paper on the ground. She knelt and picked it up, smoothing it out over her thigh.

> HEY LOUISE  
>  It's Millie! :) :) :) Tonight after curfew please come meet me outside my cabin (Sparkle, in case you don't remember!) We didn't get to hang out AT ALL today :( So have those bunny ears hop on over! (Good one, Millie!) I have all kinds of stuff to tell you that you'll REALLY want to hear!

  


Louise gawked at the note, and then she looked around once more, expecting to see Millie standing nearby. But she was nowhere to be found. She narrowed her eyes, staring at the recreational hall, the trees, the cabins— nothing. Wherever Millie was, Louise couldn't see her. That still didn't stop her from talking like she was, though. Just in case she was watching. Louise was about ninety percent sure that she had to be, because hiding like a rat was a very Millie Frock thing to do.  
  
" _No_ , Millie," she said as loudly as she could, holding up the paper. Speaking to thin air surely made her look completely insane, but then again, there was something about Millie in general that made Louise insane. She tore up the paper into several pieces and scattered it like snow over her head. "See this? Not falling for it!"  
  
She made a point of spinning in a circle under the falling paper, feeling like a total idiot putting on a show for no one, and then she stomped off to go and try to enjoy the rest of her free time, even though it had been soured.

  


•

 

Louise sat up in her bed that night, composing her first letter to her family. It was past curfew, the time that Millie had insisted on meeting, but as she had sworn, she wasn't planning on showing up. The girls had just begun to settle down in their half of the cabin, their voices quieting sleepily until one by one they had drifted off. Louise kept a lamp on, although she wasn't sure if Jessica had fallen asleep yet above her. She hadn't complained, though, so she supposed that it was alright to keep writing.

> Dear family unit:  
>  I am busting my ass off here. Gene, you were right. I don't think this is paying me enough. This wouldn't have been a problem, and I wouldn't have had to come here, if I was able to make a reasonable wage at my former place of employment (not naming names). Millie Frock, who has in fact almost killed me 3.5 times in my lifetime, is here. This is like being in prison, but it's not even cool lady prison like that one show Mom loves.

  


She paused here, contemplating where she should begin with what she had been up to so far. Mentioning her brief bout of sickness yesterday would probably just worry them. Going into detail about the many evil schemes she was certain Millie was coming up with would probably worry them, too. She settled for providing a bland description of the campgrounds, her duties, and the campers assigned to her cabin. She was trying to think of a way to describe her co-counselor when Jessica herself flipped over the side of the bed, staring at her once more like a bat. Louise jumped.  
  
"Son of a bitch!" she yelped, startled, before clapping a hand over her mouth. The exclamation sounded painfully loud in the quiet, dimly lit cabin. Jessica put a hand over her own mouth, too, but it seemed to be to prevent herself from laughing, because her shoulders were shaking. Louise sat there, straining to listen, hoping that none of the girls woke up. When it seemed that none of them had, she lowered her hand, glaring. "I thought you were asleep," she whispered, feeling offended somehow.  
  
"Kind of hard to," Jessica shot back just as quietly. "I keep hearing your pencil scratching. What are you doing?"  
  
Louise stared down at the stationery in her lap. "Writing," she said, suddenly feeling defensive, as if Jessica would laugh at her, but she did not.  
  
"My parents wanted me to, too," she said, before she pulled her head up out of sight. Her legs replaced it, dangling over the side of the bunk, and then Jessica dropped to the floor with careful poise. She ducked her head under the top bunk and took a seat right next to Louise on her bed without asking. Louise begrudgingly moved aside for her. "I said no way. I might text them, maybe."  
  
"I can't do that," said Louise. "My phone plan is shit, and I can't spend all my time stealing Ginny's Wi-Fi. My family is super into the letter writing thing, anyway. You remember them. They're weird." Her tone was unconsciously fond.  
  
"To be honest, I'm glad to be away from mine for a while," said Jessica, leaning back into the wall. Her head hit it with a little thud. "No letter. No text messages. I'm sure they're having a great time, anyway. They'll probably be on the yacht the whole time I'm gone."  
  
"You have to be joking," Louise said, staring at her. "Your family doesn't own a _yacht_. No way." Louise had very strong opinions about yacht owners. Most of those opinions were not pleasant. She, Tina, and Gene had once made a game every summer, when the tourists rolled in, of seeing who could land the most raw meat on the side of the obnoxiously-named yachts crowding the pier.  
  
"We do," said Jessica. "I stole it once."  
  
Louise slammed down her letter and her pencil immediately. Suddenly she only thing she cared about was the details of this story and how it could quite possibly cement Jessica a place of permanent admiration in her mind. "Please," she said, a little loudly, "do _not_ withhold this kind of information from me."  
  
"It was last summer," said Jessica. She was looking down at the floral sheets, a nail scraping at one of the worn spots. "We thought it'd be exciting to steal it for a couple of days. I have no idea what we were thinking, honestly. I never actually learned how to sail the thing."  
  
Louise tilted her head. "Who's 'we'?"  
  
"Mmh. Uh, my ex and I," said Jessica, looking faintly uncomfortable.  
  
Abruptly, Louise regretted asking, because the fact that Jessica's motivation for stealing a yacht was anything less than high-stakes criminal activity was incredibly disappointing. "That sounds like something my sister would do," she said, sighing. "Steal a boat so she could spend a few days making out with her boyfriend and trading motion sickness back and forth." It was a terribly boring idea. Louise had just gotten used to the idea that Jessica was capable of being more than plain wallpaper.  
  
"Not motion sickness. Sunburn. Really bad sunburn," said Jessica. "And I couldn't figure out how to get us turned around, so, uh, basically, I had to call the Coast Guard. It was a mess."  
  
This was slightly encouraging. "Well, it's not moving cocaine, but that's exciting, right?" she said, stifling a laugh.  
  
"You have got some really weird career goals," said Jessica.  
  
"Hey, I'm not the one who got arrested for stealing a boat," Louise fired back.  
  
"I didn't." Jessica brushed her hair back with her fingers. "They didn't press charges. They thought about it when it came to Max, though. They were super keen on getting her out of the picture."  
  
This confused Louise, who had stopped following about halfway through the last sentence. "Who?"  
  
There was a beat. "My ex," said Jessica.  
  
It took Louise a moment to put two and two together, and the conclusion it made startled her. So Jessica's ex was a _she_. Why did that surprise her so much? It wasn't like she knew much about her. Jessica had moved away before she had even turned ten. This fact about her was surely just one of many things she was not aware of. And it was none of her business, anyway. It only felt unusual because she'd assumed the default about her. She would just have to adjust her perceptions about Jessica, just like she'd adjusted her perceptions when Gene had come out of the closet (although that was different, because Louise had been positive about the fact that he was gay for a very long time).  
  
"Oh," she said, as nonchalantly as she could, because, really, whoever or whatever Jessica was interested in was honestly none of her business. She found herself feeling strangely curious, engaged by the idea in a way she was unused to, but instead she just smoothed past the topic. "Well, if you have any other ideas for felonies in the future, let me know. I've made a hobby out of planning how not to get caught in various scenarios. You wouldn't _believe_ the diamond heist I've thought up."  
  
Jessica stared at her, and then she snorted. "I bet," she said, but she looked at ease, and that put Louise in a good mood, too.  
  
"I mean it," she said, and then she looked down at her letter. It could wait for now. She peeled it away from the notepad and carefully tucked it beneath a fresh sheet. "Speaking of scams," she began, "you promised you'd draw up some charts for our junk food smuggling operation."  
  
Jessica's eyes lit up. "That's right," she said, holding her hands out for the notepad and paper. As soon as she had them, she was sketching away. "Alright, so let's talk supply and demand..."  
  
They had managed only five hours of sleep by morning, but they had produced twelve pages of notes, and they laughed together as they pored over them at breakfast.


	4. your enthusiasm is appreciated

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're a third of the way through this thing now! Thank you so much to everyone who's taken the time to read, kudos, and/or comment so far.

Louise should have figured that it would be harder to get into Ginny's office the second time around.  
  
That was all she could think as she and Jessica stared down a tightly locked door. She checked the time on her phone once more. She knew without having to look that Jessica was using her height to lean over her shoulder and stare down at the display, because she made a point of unnecessarily stating, "We've got twelve minutes left."  
  
"I _know_ ," Louise hissed, shifting her weight from one foot to the other and trying to think. She jiggled the knob again uselessly. "It was unlocked the last time I was here."  
  
"Maybe she found out you were snooping around," said Jessica with what Louise thought was an admonishing click of her tongue. "Did you ever think to check for security cameras? Did you leave any evidence behind?"  
  
What the hell? Louise rounded on her. "Did you just click your tongue at me?" she demanded to know, too stunned by that to rebuke the (quite honestly, offensive) implication that she wouldn't check for cameras or clean up any evidence of her wrongdoings. "Are you a _time_ traveler? Are you sure you're not someone's mother from the eighties?"  
  
"Eleven minutes," said Jessica, crossing her arms over her chest with a faint smile, her eyelids lazily half-closed.  
  
Right. As much as Louise would like to have continued along that line of questioning, Jessica was right to keep track of the time. In eleven minutes, lunch would be letting out of the mess hall, and they'd need to be there to collect their campers or risk attracting suspicion. On top of that, Ginny was likely to head immediately to her office afterwards, and if they got caught here— shit, Louise didn't want to think about it. Not because she feared Ginny's wrath, but because she was extremely keen on earning the money she'd set out to make at the Thundergirls Summer Camp in the first place, and getting fired would not be conducive to that.  
  
Jessica's analysis of Louise's black market plan had pointed out a number of flaws and weaknesses. First, Jessica had pointed out, they would need to know how Ginny was placing supply orders, and to where. Secondly, to even access that information, they'd probably have to set aside time to hunt for it— and the most likely place it would be stored had to be her office. It was only logical. Thirdly, Jessica had noted, they would need to be completely discreet. Louise had to admit that she was certainly earning her forty percent so far.  
  
Louise was loathe to have a plan backfire on her. Just the very thought of getting caught here lit a fire under her that had her hands shaking, her eyes bright with determination. It was a sort of excitement, in a way; it thrilled her in a manner that she could not quite define. Getting into trouble always had; she could just about hear her father's disapproving groan in the back of her head right now.  
  
('It is probably bad,' Gene had said once, when he was holding up a stencil to help her spray paint an obscene haiku about a journalist that had (in Louise's opinion) wronged the family restaurant onto the underside of the overpass that led out of town, 'that you get such an adrenaline rush from committing misdemeanors.'  
  
'Probably,' Louise had replied. 'Okay, now hold up the one for _fuck_.'  
  
'Your haiku doesn't even follow the five-seven-five pattern,' said Gene. 'As a lyricist, I have to say that this is not worth risking arrest for.')  
  
"Shit," Louise muttered, backing away from the door. She recalled that there was a window in Ginny's office. That would be their best bet at this point. She pressed both hands to Jessica's bicep and gave her a push in the direction of the exit. "Okay. Okay, outside. Let's go, Oatmeal."  
  
Jessica waved her hands languidly, although she didn't seem all that perturbed by Louise's insistent physical guidance. "Oatmeal?" was all she noted. "You're running out of ideas."  
  
"Shut up," groaned Louise, shoving Jessica out the door and then stepping ahead of her, moving quickly around the side of the staff building and towards the back, kicking aside the long grass as she went. "Whole Wheat Bread was too long, you know?"  
  
"I'm starting to think that all of these nicknames are just you finding new ways to call me boring," Jessica said.  
  
Louise found herself strangely at odds with that accusation, and after a moment of pressing her lips together, she shunted the feeling aside and shot back, "You're being pretty hard on yourself, Number Two Pencil."  
  
There were a number of windows in the back of the trailer-style building, and Louise strained to see up into them, trying to identify which was the one connected to Ginny's office. She gripped the ledges and tried to use her arms to haul herself upwards, hopping as she did. Her determination to get to what they needed outweighed the self-consciousness she felt about her petite frame, although part of her was still certain that Jessica was laughing at her, and although she didn't hear a sound coming from her co-counselor, she said, between hops, "Oh, it's _so easy_ for you, right? Your kind just stomps around all the time, crushing cities, throwing cars—"  
  
"Excuse me?" When Louise looked over her shoulder she saw that Jessica was standing over by a tree, looking out past the staff building like a watchman.  
  
"What are you, six feet tall?" Louise crossed to the next window and started over, grabbing onto the ledge and hopping up to peer into it.  
  
"Five-nine," said Jessica, fully meeting Louise's expectations by replying to a question she didn't actually want the answer to.  
  
It wasn't the right window. Louise moved to the next one. "Lamppost," she said.  
  
"How is a lamppost boring?"  
  
"How is a lamppost _exciting?_ ...Wait. Wait, holy shit, _no_ , don't answer, I don't actually want to have that conversation," groaned Louise. She was starting to pant a little from the exertion of all of the hopping. Her family was not athletic, and she was no exception. She would laugh at Gene every time he got winded climbing up the stairs, but it happened to her, too.  
  
Jessica had stepped forward, and now she gently pushed Louise aside and promptly looked into the window. She didn't have to jump at all— she hardly had to lean up, just straightening her posture a little bit. Louise would have resented her for it, but, she reasoned, she would have to save that for later. They were running out of time. She checked her phone. Eight minutes left.  
  
"This is the one," announced Jessica. Louise nearly gave a jump just to look into the window to confirm it for herself, but she stayed where she was, a hand pressed to her ribs, willing herself not to wheeze. Jessica was reaching up, pressing her hands firmly against the glass. The window began to squeak aside as her co-counselor slid it open. "Okay," said Jessica. "I'll boost you."  
  
Louise stared at her. She wanted to lament the indignity of it all, but the window was high, Jessica was tall, and she was small. These three facts combined to create one truth: Louise would have to go through the window. She quelled the twitching underneath her eyes and put her hands on her hips. "Gotcha," she said, deciding that she would go all James Bond on this thing. "Let's go."  
  
Jessica dropped to one knee and created a cradle with her hands. Louise decided that there was one benefit here: she could take great pleasure from planting her pit boots right into Jessica's smooth, pale hands. She then realized that she had assessed Jessica's hands as _smooth_ in her head and felt decidedly uncomfortable about it for a reason she did not care to analyze, before telling herself to stop thinking entirely so that she could focus on the task at hand. She stepped up into Jessica's hold and grabbed onto the edge of the window. With a grunt of effort, Jessica hauled her mass upwards, giving Louise the leverage needed to throw herself bodily into the opening. For a moment she dangled there, halfway in and halfway out, before she gave a couple of kicks and successfully threw her weight forward.  
  
She tumbled gracelessly into Ginny's office with a thud. For a moment she sat there on the floor, groaning and rubbing at the knee she had struck on the ground, but she had endured worse on past sneaking excursions. Her hat had become loose at one point, and she readjusted it before proceeding. Six minutes, her phone informed her.  
  
It took four of those remaining minutes to dig through the contents of Ginny's desk and the cabinets before Louise found what she thought she was looking for, a folder indicating inventory tracking for the mess hall's kitchen. After thumbing through the file, she hit the jackpot: order forms, along with delivery dates scheduled for roughly every five days. A supplier would drive in from the next town over into Gold Ridge Lake, carrying whatever Ginny and her staff deemed necessary to replenish the kitchen supplies. Louise whipped out her phone once more and took a photo of one of the sheets, centering it on the name and phone number of the supplier.  
  
"Did you hear the loudspeaker?" Jessica's voice called through the window. She sounded unworried as she said, "Lunch is out, just so you know."  
  
"It's okay!" Louise called back, a little louder than necessary. "I have it!" She couldn't keep the smug edge out of her voice, nor the thrill of victory. She quickly slapped the folder's contents back together and slammed all of the drawers shut. "I'll meet you out front!" She went to close the window and then let herself out of Ginny's office through the door, ensuring that the lock was engaged again before shutting it. By the time she was outside of the staff building through the front entrance, Jessica was already there. Across the great, expansive lawn, beyond the pitch, they could see people slowly trickling out of the mess hall.  
  
"Everything okay?" Jessica asked as they began a power walk in the direction of the mess hall.  
  
"Pfffft." Louise exhaled long and hard, and, she hoped, casually. "Was there any doubt?"  
  
"You looked pretty funny thrashing around stuck in the window back there."  
  
Louise's expression soured immediately. "I was not _stuck_ ," she said, but by the time she had a clever rebuttal prepared, they had reached the other side of the pitch and their campers were rushing up to them, all smiles. They immediately launched into a veritable assault of chatter, something that Louise had yet to become fully used to even on her fourth day with them.  
  
"Anna says today is arts and crafts day!" Violet enthused.  
  
"I didn't say that!" Anna interjected immediately, looking alarmed. "I said I _hoped_ it was—"  
  
"Can we do arts and crafts?" pleaded Georgia, reaching out for Louise's sleeve. "I'm tired of sports." Louise told herself that thinking _Oh, god, it's touching me_ was probably the wrong way to go here, but she still found herself thinking it anyway as she gently pushed the girl's hand away.  
  
"We follow a _schedule_ ," Penelope said firmly and sensibly. "Today is canoeing."  
  
" _I_ think we should do cooking—" began June.  
  
Jessica snapped her fingers. "You're all wrong. Today we're going ziplining."  
  
_What._ Louise's expression was just as startled as that of the campers. She _really_ should have put more effort into reading the schedule, she supposed, but as long as one of them — Jessica, that is — was doing it, it sort of felt like she didn't have to. But this meant that she had to cling onto every word just as much as the campers of Twinkle Cabin did as Jessica elaborated.  
  
"Let's see," said Jessica, reaching into the pocket of her shorts and slipping free a folded piece of paper. She shook it out and scanned it over. "We're the first cabin that gets to do it, actually. It's only one cabin at a time. It's about a half-hour drive— it's a little bit away from the lake."  
  
The girls had quickly begun to warm up to the idea, and now they were looking at one another with excitement, babbling at a rapid clip about how fun it could be. Louise took the chance to touch Jessica on her still-bandaged elbow. "So, _juuust_ saying, but I don't remember zipline safety, or rigging, or anything like that being part of our training?" She tilted her head a little. "I mean," she said, suddenly grinning, "not like that's a _bad_ thing. Shit, we can just MacGyver it."  
  
"You're right," said Jessica, nodding. "That's why Ginny's coming along."  
  
The mild bit of excitement Louise had just barely begun to feel fizzled away. "That woman, ziplining? Seriously?"  
  
"You know," said Jessica, a hand on her hip, "you're unusually harsh on her, Louise. She gave you a job here."  
  
"You don't know her like I do," said Louise conspiratorially, although, if she had to be perfectly honest, her claim was mostly bullshit, because her impression of Ginny was deeply colored by the Thundergirls troop mole incident she'd been involved in when she was still a child. Ginny had always been a strange, paranoid woman, and time had only seemed to ripen that. Either way, the thought of her on a zipline was nearly unfathomable.  
  
"We'll see," said Jessica, tucking the schedule away. "Come on. We've got to be at the meetup point in fifteen minutes."

  


•

 

One very rocky van ride later, the campers and counselors of Twinkle Cabin poured out into the hot sun, most of them looking a little carsick. Ginny clambered out of the driver's seat; her neutral expression seemed to always fall into the category of 'vaguely nauseous', so Louise couldn't decide if her own driving actually affected her the way it apparently did others. She distributed water bottles out of her backpack to each of the campers as Ginny put on her sunglasses and lowered her visor.  
  
"Alright," the camp director said, before proceeding to launch into what Louise was certain was one of the dullest speeches about zipline safety the world had ever borne witness to, which was surely a title with plenty of competition vying for top billing. By the time Ginny was done, most of the campers were sitting on the ground and trading stickers from the seemingly infinite supply in their backpacks. Louise had never quite figured out how little girls kept their sticker supplies flowing endlessly, not even when she had been a little girl herself.  
  
"And that's all," said Ginny conclusively, and these three words told Louise that now was the time to nod seriously and look engaged. Ginny did not seem entirely convinced, but Jessica was alert and attentive, which seemed to be good enough for her, because she then beckoned the campers to their feet. "Let's head over. It's just down this path," Ginny announced.  
  
Louise wasn't sure just what, exactly, she was expecting. She had never been ziplining before, mostly because there were few opportunities for such things in her seaside hometown. The tower was enormous, a huge, structured thing with a winding staircase that went up six or seven stories. The upper platform fed out into two lines parallel to one another that stretched out above the trees and let off at a secondary, smaller tower. The campers were staring, wide-eyed, as Ginny led the way to the main tower. Louise felt a slight pang of longing when she thought about how much both Tina and Gene would be into the whole thing. Well, maybe Tina would need some convincing, but she'd definitely have gotten into it eventually.  
  
Ginny provided both counselors a run-through on assembling and securing the harnesses, which were located in a storage shed at the base of the main tower. They fastened them onto each of the campers with Ginny double and triple checking their work. This took about twenty minutes of slow, agonizing, and ultimately failing coordination. Louise was trying to connect the rings on Georgia's harness when Jessica's elbow bumped into her side.  
  
"Sorry," said Jessica automatically.  
  
Louise huffed, feeling sweaty and annoyed with the whole thing already. "So are _we_ going to get to go on this thing, or what?"  
  
Jessica smiled a little. "Not until the rest of them." She gave Sydney a nudge to get her to turn around. "Why? Do you like ziplining?"  
  
"I've never actually gone," Louise said.  
  
"You know," Jessica spoke without lifting her eyes from her deftly moving hands, "it's not actually that fun, right?"  
  
"Not fun," repeated Louise. Was this another bizarre showing of Jessica-style humor? Was it self-referential, somehow? Surely Jessica had to see the irony in calling something boring? "How could it not be fun?"  
  
"You'll see," said Jessica with, Louise felt, a completely unnecessary tone of mystery. Yet it disarmed her, skewing her off-balance as so many things about Jessica seemed to do for the strangest reasons and at the oddest times. She stared into her face for a few moments before returning to the task before her.  
  
Once Ginny was fully satisfied that they had assembled the harnesses in a way that would not result in a horrible accident that would kill the campers, she led the climb up the tower. Louise and Jessica were made to carry but not wear their harnesses. As they ascended, Ginny spoke to Louise, who supposed that she was certainly overdue for her latest pestering from the camp director.  
  
"Well, Miss Belcher, I take it you've been adjusting fine? Enjoying yourself? You must be, since I have yet to receive your incident report," said Ginny in a manner that mastered both concern and passive-aggressiveness in a way that Louise could not help but admire. She vowed not to become as neurotic as Ginny was once she reached that age, but her laserlike ability to find fault in anything was a thing to be envied.  
  
"Oh, yeah!" enthused Louise, laying it on as thick as possible. "Sorry, I've just been having _so_ much fun that I keep forgetting to. The fun here at the Thundergirls Summer Camp just _never_ stops! Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever—"  
  
Ginny winced. "Alright, Miss Belcher—"  
  
"—ever, ever, ever—"  
  
"I see your point." Ginny stepped onto the topmost platform, looking exhausted, but probably not from the climb up.  
  
"— _ever_ stops," finished Louise, smiling as hard as she could. It made her face hurt a little. Beside her, Jessica climbed onto the platform, snorting underneath her breath.  
  
"Your enthusiasm is appreciated," Ginny said evenly.  
  
"Well, you know," sighed Louise in her most dramatically regretful voice, "the only thing that gets me down is that I've only got a few weeks here with you and all the precious children." One of said 'precious children' jostled her elbow as they all scrambled onto the upper platform, clinging to one another as they peered over the edges, emitting fearful squeaks back and forth at one another. They reminded Louise of a group of hamsters.  
  
Ginny seemed to be relieved to not have to address this blatant sarcasm in favor of dividing the campers into pairings of two. This was followed by having the girls play rock-paper-scissors to decide which pairing would go first, a process that ate up another ten minutes as they all spooked one another out of having to do it. In the end, Jessica stepped up, selected two, and then had them connected before they could change their minds.  
  
Louise had to admit that there was at least a tiny bit of joy in watching the kids clutch at one another on the edge, shrieking about the drop like they were about to be made to walk a plank into the ocean. It made her very badly want to reach over and shove them off the edge; whatever reprimand Ginny would give her would be totally worth it. But they overcame their fear before she could give any real thought to the idea, and they screamed the entire way across, where Ginny was waiting for them at the opposite tower. Jessica called up another pair and repeated the same process with military precision; by now, Louise had come to recognize that leadership came naturally to her, despite her introversion. This made her feel slightly jealous; Louise longed to be a leader at all times but had to work very hard to make others take her seriously, whereas Jessica seemed to fall automatically into the role.  
  
Once all of the campers had gone down, Louise stood alone with Jessica on the tower. She looked across to where the campers and Ginny were waving as Jessica picked their harnesses off of the floor. "Well, let's get this over with," she said with a sigh, holding one out to Louise. She began strapping herself in, drawing it tight around her thighs and waist. Louise tried to copy her movements with considerably less success.  
  
"Okay, so do you wanna go back to that thing you said before? About how this is apparently going to be boring?" Louise demanded. "Because after Ginny's driving, her speeches, all the tying and climbing, and then watching them all get to do it, I think this is the most exciting thing that'll have happened today."  
  
Jessica snapped the harness shut over her chest. "It's just that you kind of coast along," she said. "It's not as fast as it looks. There are more exciting extreme sports out there."  
  
Seriously? "So you're an adrenaline junkie," said Louise disbelievingly. "God, Milk, you've really got to start getting more congruous with your interests and your personality."  
  
"Hold on." Jessica moved close. For one absurd moment, Louise thought that she had rattled her. That maybe she'd truly annoyed her, and Jessica was going to snap back, or tell her to stop— but what happened instead was more startling. Jessica reached out and took hold of the straps around Louise's waist. She tightened them gently and then slid two fingers inside to test the fit. Louise jumped a little when she felt them press against her side, too stunned to do anything other than allow Jessica to adjust the harness for her. She hadn't asked if Louise had wanted her to, hadn't warned her— just stepped forward and done it. Louise, whose personal space bubble was typically three feet in all directions, found herself tentatively unbothered— which bothered her in itself.  
  
"There," said Jessica, and she was standing so close that her chin nearly bumped Louise's forehead as she spoke. She took a small step back. She hadn't missed a beat. "You ready?" She reached up to connect Louise to the cable without waiting for an answer, grabbing for her own. She gave both a tug and double-checked everything.  
  
Louise still felt like Jessica was standing in her space somehow, even though she had moved out of it. Her throat had gone dry. The sun, she decided, was getting to her again. "Uh... yeah." She nodded and moved towards the edge of the platform. Suddenly, they seemed to be very high up; looking down made her experience a touch of vertigo, and she leaned back a little. _Boring,_ Jessica had said.  
  
"Are you scared?" Jessica asked, looking sideways at her. Her sneakers were halfway off the edge, and she looked ready to jump right off. A wind picked up, blowing over the top of the tower and whipping Jessica's red-blonde hair around her face.  
  
Louise flared. "Sweet, naive baby. If that's you trying to get me to leap off like a graceful freaking swan," she said, "it's not working."  
  
"Come on." Suddenly, Jessica's hands were clutching at hers, grabbing them tight. Louise jerked her chin up to look at her. The automatic instinct that rolled through her was to recoil, to tug away, but Jessica's grip was firm, and her gaze was sure and steady; Louise found herself gripping back.  
  
"Fine," Louise breathed out, and suddenly her show of bravado didn't matter any more, because she was abruptly aware that Jessica had never believed in it anyway. " _Fine_ , okay, let's go." A sort of relief bubbled in her chest, followed by a pleased, excited feeling. The kind of satisfaction she really only ever felt when hanging out with Gene and sometimes Tina.  
  
Jessica nodded, swinging their hands together with a smile. "Count of three."  
  
That sounded fine to Louise, who shifted her center of mass slightly. "Okay."  
  
"One," said Jessica.  
  
_On three_ , Louise reminded herself. She had two more counts to prepare.  
  
"Three," said Jessica, and then, "Sorry!" before she pulled them both off the edge.  
  
It was not Louise's proudest moment: just like the campers, she screamed all the way down.

  


•

  

> Louise Belcher  
>  Thundergirls Summer Camp  
>  P.O. Box #4301  
>  Gold Ridge Lake  
>    
>  hey louise, hope you get this letter in RECORD TIME because i have preloaded the envelope with all kinds of stamps. mom says that the amount of stamps i use won't make any difference, but what does SHE know??? it's not like mom works for the post office, i mean does she have some kind of CRAZY SECRET INSIGHT into how the post office works? no, i really don't think so, because that seems like the kind of thing we would have found out about her sooner. the US postal system is not a secret society (PROBABLY)  
>    
>  look, the reason i volunteered to be the one to write you back is because of the millie thing. AVOID AT ALL COSTS, i'm just being honest with you here because you're my sister and also my best friend but she's DEFINITELY going to try to pull an orange is the new black on you. i mean why wouldn't she?!?! she's got the perfect opportunity there! louise, you have to make allies. that's what i've learned about powderkeg scenarios involving a bunch of confined women. on the other hand, maybe millie is the key to you coming home with a spicy story about summer camp. i'm pretty conflicted about it and i don't know what else to tell you. maybe you shouldn't listen to me at all.  
>    
>  i'm still trying to figure out how to break the thailand thing to mom and dad. i started writing a song about it, but that's not really working out. i'm thinking of setting up a camera somewhere secret in the restaurant and breaking it to them like that and then putting the video on youtube where it will HOPEFULLY go viral. that was ken's idea BTW. did you know his channel just hit 200,000 subscribers?? AMAZING.  
>    
>  the truth is that we all miss you a lot already. dad is losing his mind. i think he's realized for the first time just how old he is, and it's all your fault for going away for a few weeks. he pretty much won't stop talking about what it'll be like when we're all adults and moved out and stuff, but i told him that the joke's on him because i want to live with him and mom until i'm 40. i want to run a burlesque show out of the basement (that's how i'll contribute instead of paying rent.)  
>    
>  anyway, i hope you're having fun, or that you finally learn what fun is, and the meaning of christmas, and i'll write you again even if you're having too many spicy adventures to find the time to write back.  
>    
>  love, gene ( & dad, mom, tina, and the grill, plus teddy says hi )

  
  


The letter that had arrived for Louise bright and early the following morning had her grinning all throughout breakfast. It was a pretty promising start to a day with plenty of downtime scheduled in; the campers would be preoccupied all the way until the evening with inter-cabin sporting events run by senior staff members. Today Louise could take care of a few tasks: she could get her incident report in to Ginny, phone up the supplier whose number she'd stolen, write to her family once more, and generally just continue trying to avoid Millie Frock at all costs.  
  
She had begun to adjust to the general rhythm and pattern of things; Louise was stunned to find that sticking to a schedule for breakfast, lunch, and dinner and following a pre-set list of events actually helped her day go pretty smoothly. This concerned her somewhat, as it meant that Linda's oft-noted observation of 'Military school would be good for you, Louise' might actually be correct.  
  
Jessica had been up, showered, dressed, and out of the cabin before Louise had even fully gotten out of bed, but she was still in the mess hall by the time Louise made it there, finishing off her meal while seated next to Millie's co-counselor. They seemed to be engaged in some kind of conversation; Louise slapped her tray down across from the both of them and attempted to tune in. When there was a lull, she couldn't help but ask, "Where's Millie?"  
  
"That's strange," said the girl seated at Jessica's side. "She asked the same about you before she left."  
  
"Sure dodged _that_ bullet," Louise muttered, before focusing on the girl's wan, slender face. "What's your name, anyway? I can't keep calling you 'girl who's stuck with Millie'."  
  
"Vicky," came the reply, and she looked more worried than ever. There was a tightness to her features that made her look perpetually ready to start grimacing. Louise was reminded of Tina. "You know Millie? She says you've been friends since you were both in the third grade."  
  
"We _aren't_ friends," Louise said vehemently. "I don't know what she's been telling you, but I am _not_ friends with Millie. The third grade thing— okay, so that's not a lie. We've known each other for that long, it's true. But she's my nemesis, and not even the _good_ kind. Like, really, I can think of a million other people I'd rather give that slot to. Like Alton Brown."  
  
Jessica spoke up. "Alton Brown?" she asked incredulously.  
  
"You know," said Louise, flustered, "the guy from _Good Eats_ and _Iron Chef_ —"  
  
"I know who Alton Brown is," said Jessica, reaching up to clip her hair out of her face with a pin she had produced from her pocket. "What have you got against him?"  
  
"He," began Louise, startled; she had never had to explain her Alton Brown-related feelings to anyone before, because Gene and Tina both accepted it with understanding. "He's got this smug, know-it-all face that I just wanna punch."  
  
"But you don't want to punch Millie?" Jessica inquired. "You keep saying how much you hate her."  
  
"You have to _enjoy_ your nemesis," Louise insisted, feeling somewhat defensive of her standards. "Millie's not fun. She's, like... I don't know. A nose that never stops running."  
  
Vicky was staring between the two of them, her butter knife poised above her bread roll. "So, um, you _don't_ want me to tell Millie I've seen you?" She deflated. "It's really hard to lie to her."  
  
"Of course I don't!" Louise heaved, but when she saw the look on Vicky's face, she felt bad for her and tried to elaborate. "...Yeah. She's kind of like a dog. She sniffs things out. She acts dumb, but don't treat her that way, 'cause she's actually pretty sharp." That was probably the highest compliment she'd ever paid out to Millie, so she added, for insurance, "I mean, most evil people are."  
  
Vicky nodded, looking absorbed by Louise's words, as if this was indispensable, life-saving information; Louise supposed that, in a way, it might be. Then she was gathering her used cutlery onto her tray, pushing her chair out, standing up, and excusing herself. "It was nice to talk to you both," she said, somewhat ruefully, before she wobbled to the trash bins lined up by the wall. Louise watched her go.  
  
"She really was here," said Jessica finally. Louise turned to look at her. "Millie, I mean. That's why I came to sit down with Vicky here. Millie didn't stick around long. She said something about catching bugs."  
  
Louise could think of a thousand different scenarios, all of them horrifying, involving the factors _Millie_ and _insects_ combined with Millie's obsession with her, but, for the sake of remaining sane, decided not to dwell on it. "Whatever." She sighed. "What are _your_ plans for today?"  
  
Jessica put her chin in her hand. "I was going to swim in the lake. Want to come with?"  
  
Louise recalled the murky green water and the rock-strewn shore and shuddered. She still could not see the appeal of entering it. "No, thanks," she said, and then there was a lull of silence. Louise hesitated. "But I mean, if you wanted to go to the pool, then..."  
  
"Then you'd come?" Jessica finished, slanting an eyebrow. "Really?"  
  
This was dangerously close to Louise having to admit that she wanted to hang out with Jessica— not because they shared a cabin, not because they were co-counselors, not because they were injured, and not because they were breaking into Ginny's office. Just because Jessica seemed _alright_ , and a part of her blanched at the idea of outright rejecting an offer to spend time with her. That was normal, right? It was _perfectly_ normal, Louise reasoned, although she was forced to admit to herself that she had a poor general impression of 'normal', because her best friends were her own siblings, and she made it a point to keep all of her school friends at arm's length. But it wasn't as though she were inviting Jessica to go shopping with her at the mall. Gross.  
  
"Sure," said Louise, suddenly feeling a little bit foolish. "Yeah."  
  
Jessica said nothing about the delay in Louise's response, nor did she remark on the sudden hesitation in her voice— although her gaze did linger, which made Louise wonder if she had noticed something after all. "Okay. We'll go to the pool." Jessica checked the time on her phone. "What time do you want to head down?"  
  
"I was going to call that supplier, actually," said Louise, remembering her top priority for the day. "Sooo... sometime after that?"  
  
"Good call," Jessica said. "Alright. One hour. I'll see you at the rec hall."

  


•

 

Louise had been forced to bluff when she had called the supplier. She had lied, firstly, that she was eighteen and that, secondly, she worked for the camp kitchen. But after she had wrangled her credibility, it had been smooth sailing from there; she wasn't even questioned about why she was adding a huge quantity of candy bars to the next shipment, or why she needed it addressed to _Alanis Alton_ , or why she insisted on paying in cash. She had always been an excellent negotiator.  
  
Satisfied that she had secured the order, Louise headed back to Twinkle Cabin to gather her swim gear. It was a small miracle that she had even brought it to begin with; it hadn't featured anywhere on her packing list, and it was only because of Linda's input and insistence that she had put a swimsuit into her luggage at all. Upon re-entering the cabin, she was somewhat dismayed to find the front portion a complete mess; it seemed that both she and Jessica had neglected to instruct their campers to make their beds and pick their clothes up off of the floor this morning. She stepped carefully around and between the strewn sheets and shirts, making her way to the back of the cabin where the bunk she shared with Jessica was.  
  
Ten minutes later, she had her plain black one-piece on underneath her clothes. She had opted to change out of her uniform, since today was downtime anyway. Her cable-knit olive sweater was definitely a terrible idea in the heat, but it was the first thing Louise spotted on top of her clothes, and she was already running late. By the time she had made it to the recreational hall, she was sweating and more than ready to plunge herself into the pool.  
  
She found Jessica standing outside of the hall, a sport bag slung over one shoulder. "It's closed," she said, instead of offering a greeting.  
  
Louise stopped short, dancing from one impatient foot to another, ready to rip her sweater right off. "What? _Closed_?"  
  
"I mean, technically we can go inside," said Jessica. "It's just that the pool's been drained."  
  
Louise wanted to call bullshit, to go inside and check for herself, but Jessica looked disappointed, too. That was probably what triggered the following, automatic reply: "Okay. The lake. Let's go." She could not believe what she was saying.  
  
"Really?" Jessica stared right at her. "I thought you thought the lake was gross."  
  
"It is," Louise moaned, "so how about we go now before I change my mind?"  
  
Jessica broke into a smile. "Yeah, okay." She hauled her sport bag up higher on her shoulder and gave a jerk of her head in the direction of the lake. She then did what Louise was hoping she wouldn't do and pointed out the obvious: "You look like you're boiling in that thing."  
  
"Stop," huffed Louise, that much more aware of the sweat on the back of her neck. Jessica, on the other hand, looked completely unruffled by the weather. Her face, which Louise had gauged as plain and unremarkable a few days ago, had a carefree ease to it, an alertness in her sharp eyes. Once more, Louise felt that she was impossible to read, impossible to stay toe-to-toe with— and, ultimately, a part of her wanted very badly to know just _why_ and _how_.  
  
Louise kept up with Jessica as best as she could, matching two strides to each one of the other girl's, and soon they were at the dock where the colorful Thundergirls canoes bobbed gently in the water. The lake looked even less appealing in the bright sunlight of the afternoon than it had when the sunset had stained it gold a few days ago. The water looked sludgy, like the stuff Louise would watch leak out of the grease trap in the alley behind the restaurant. Gene would argue that Mort was disposing of dead organic matter in there, too, which had to be why it smelled so bad, and Louise felt that his theory had even more credibility to it now as she stared down into the putridly-colored water.  
  
Jessica had shed her clothes while Louise was reconsidering entering the lake, kicking them into a pile on the dock. Louise turned to look at her. In her purple swimsuit, Jessica was lean and athletic, and Louise half-expected her to execute a graceful jump with perfect diver's form, but instead she just lowered herself and sat with her long legs hanging over the edge of the dock, turning to look at Louise over her shoulder expectantly.  
  
_Right_ , thought Louise. "Give me a second," she said, dropping her towel and then reaching up to carefully ensure that her hat remained in place as she tugged her sweater off. She stepped out of her skirt after that and then sat to remove her boots, yanking the laces through the eyelets with rough, practiced fingers.  
  
"You're going swimming with your hat on," said Jessica, and from the tone of her voice Louise knew that she hadn't forgotten the wager they'd made in the infirmary. Louise had no plans to lose it.  
  
"You bet, Tap Water." Louise scooted up next to her on the dock. Jessica's legs were long enough that they disappeared into the water at the ankles. Louise's toes didn't even come close to skimming it. "I'm telling you, you're going to be out a hundred dollars."  
  
"I'd pull it off of you, but that'd be cheating," said Jessica thoughtfully. "I want to win this fairly."  
  
"There's no strategy you could put to work to actually win," said Louise gravely. "Also, if you even _try_ to pull my hat off, I'll tear your face out. It'd be _crazy_. You wouldn't even have a face any more. You'd need a transplant. Your parents? _Devastated._ They'd say, 'Oh, that's our daughter, Jessica. She was in an _accident_. Now we keep her locked in this cage.'"  
  
"You're so charming. No wonder Millie's so in love with you," said Jessica in a tone of mock awe that made Louise want to give her a shove— so she did. Jessica began laughing, leaning away from Louise's clawing hands. "Hey, I'm sorry!"  
  
Clearly, she wasn't, but Louise wasn't angry, or even annoyed. She began to laugh, too. "You're not sorry! Oh my god, my actual _stalker_ is here and you've got no sympathy for me."  
  
"Sorry," Jessica said cheerfully. "You get riled up so easily. Millie triggers this Pavlovian kind of response in you."  
  
Louise hated the idea of being that predictable, and yet she knew that it was unfailingly true. "Yeah. Arf." She groaned, drawing her knees up. Jessica's eyes fell against her leg.  
  
"What's this?" she asked, and suddenly her fingers were touching Louise's left thigh, high up on her leg, a few inches below the hip. "A tattoo?"  
  
Louise made a startled sound, her eyes flicking up to Jessica's face uncomprehendingly, and then down at her leg— oh. Right. The tattoo. The Kuchi Kopi stick-and-poke Gene had given her last year. She stared numbly down at it, at its vacant eyes and cute little ears and Jessica's... Jessica's fingertips, right there against her leg—  
  
The hand withdrew. Louise blinked. She felt disoriented, somehow.  
  
"Yeah," she exhaled, "yeah, a tattoo." She put her own hand against it, running a fingertip over its outline. She could still feel the impression of Jessica's fingers against her leg. She swallowed. "Gene, uh..." She hummed with uneasy amusement. "Gene and I got drunk. Holy shit, our parents were so mad." Recalling the story cleared her head somewhat.  
  
_What the hell is wrong with me?_ she thought to herself irritably, annoyed at the fact that she had again been so easily dismantled by Jessica, who didn't even seem to be trying to do anything at all other than just being there. Something strange was brewing in her chest, in her _head_ , and Louise did not like it.  
  
"It's kind of cute," said Jessica. "A little weird, I mean, but that suits you."  
  
Louise's face felt hot. She did the only thing she could think of to do. She shoved Jessica off of the dock.  
  
The resulting splash was incredible, as was the cry of shock Jessica gave before her head went under. Just that uncharacteristically loud sound alone made it worth it, even as Jessica surfaced, sputtering, and wrapped a hand around Louise's ankle. Louise put in a futile effort of trying to grip onto the dock to keep herself in place, but Jessica kept her grip tight, and with a few well-timed yanks, Louise went flying into the water as well.  
  
The coldness of it was a shock, and it felt just as slimy on her skin as it looked; between that and trying to keep her hat on her head, Louise was thrashing, yelping as she broke through to the surface. Her bunny ears had flopped forward into her face, but her hat was in place, at least. She shoved the ears out of her eyes and looked at Jessica, who was floating next to her.  
  
"Worth it," Louise panted. Lake water ran down her face and into her mouth. She gagged and spat it out.  
  
"Really ladylike," said Jessica, running a hand through her hair. "The spitting and coughing. Super cool."  
  
"Runs in the family," Louise said matter-of-factly. Now that she was acclimating to the temperature of the water, its relative sliminess didn't seem as bad. She paddled in place, deciding that she could tolerate it.  
  
"Was it because I called you weird?" Jessica asked, turning over onto her back and spreading her arms in the water. She smiled crookedly. "Or because I called you cute?"  
  
Being in the water made Louise feel cooled down enough to answer evenly, shooting back, "You decide." She was fairly satisfied with the steadiness of her response— at least for now, until she figured out how best to stay on the ball around Jessica. She had already decided that she was not keen on allowing herself to be caught off-guard again.  
  
They swam for nearly an hour after that, trading stories as they floated in the water about their respective high schools and their friends at home. Jessica related a few anecdotes about the part-time jobs she'd held before becoming a Thundergirls camp counselor, and Louise filled her in on the ups and downs that Bob's Burgers had endured throughout the years. She had just finished telling the story about the last — and worst — grease fire they'd had, one that had shut the restaurant down for two weeks as it was cleaned up and aired out.  
  
When they emerged from the lake, Jessica threw her towel over her shoulders and touched the bandage wrapped around her elbow. It was sodden, barely clinging on. "It's soaked," said Jessica. "But I mean, it's probably about time I took it off, anyway." She slid her fingernails beneath the tape and peeled it away, undoing the wrapping.  
  
Underneath, the wound was an unpleasant sight, but it wasn't nearly as bad as it had looked when Louise had launched the tree branch that had caused it in the first place. It had scabbed over pretty well, and it would surely leave a scar; Louise tried not to feel guilty again looking at it. She reached out and touched Jessica just above her elbow. "Looks like you get to keep your arm this time," she said seriously. "Next time, I won't go so easy on you."  
  
Jessica had picked up Louise's towel, as well, and now she tossed it at her. Her smile flickered bright. "I hope you don't," she said, eyes narrowing, and then she was stepping away, hauling her sport bag onto her arm and slipping on her shoes.  
  
Louise stared at her. She was still wondering what that was supposed to mean by the time they were toweled off and heading back to their cabin.


	5. so that means you like me

Louise was wedged between Ginny's van and the side of the mess hall with her hands pressed to the wall as she watched the delivery truck pull in. It was probably not the best hiding place, all things considered; she knew that Ginny was likely to return to the van at any moment once the delivery was completed. She watched intensely as the camp director herself, along with her assistant, conversed with the driver. A second delivery worker slid out of the passenger's side seat and moved around to the back of the truck to haul the heavy doors open.  
  
Ginny spoke. Louise strained to hear her, wishing — not for the first time — that she had actual rabbit ears and not just a hat. "Amber, can you double-check the order?" She was passing her clipboard over to her assistant, who reached out for it without a word of protest and crossed around to the back of the truck as well.  
  
Squashed against the wall, Louise began to sweat, and it was not just because of the ugly polyester shirt that was a part of her uniform. _Shit_ , she thought. She hadn't considered that Ginny would want to check over the stock to be certain that it was all there, but of _course_ she should have considered it. She cursed herself, praying to whatever entity would listen that they would not uncover the box meant for an 'Alanis Alton'.  
  
The second week of her time at the Thundergirls Summer Camp had just begun, and Louise was already fairly certain that she was about to lose her job. She imagined a future in which she would have to explain to prospective employers that she had been fired from the only job she had ever managed to secure outside of her family's restaurant because she had tried to run a black market.  
  
She reached into her pocket and withdrew her cell phone. Glancing around furtively for the thousandth time, she unlocked it and pulled up the photo gallery, tapping the _Booster_ subfolder. Roughly two hundred photos of Boo Boo stared back at her. She touched one of them, and it filled the screen in colorful high-definition. Louise groaned as she stared at it, sagging against the wall.  
  
"Wish me luck," she said to the photo, despondent. Boo Boo was frozen and perfectly framed in a dazzling shot of him captured mid-jump during the concert she and Tina had caught in Trenton slightly over a year ago. In spite of their lifetime bans from all Boyz4Now performances stemming from the tour bus incident years back, they had seen them live half a dozen times anyway. Their security detail was decidedly not very skilled- Louise had broken into two dressing rooms so far, and she planned on going for a third in the future.  
  
But right now all that mattered was that looking at him made her feel a little bit better, mostly because he really was unbearably pathetic and stupid, and regardless of whether or not she was fired here, she would never be as sad and dumb as Boo Boo. _You wonderful moron,_ she thought at him frustratedly, and then she clutched her phone hard enough that she thought she could feel the case buckle.  
  
Amber was counting out boxes, calling out the numbers and contents as she compared her checklist to the tall young delivery boy's. Although Louise felt sick with nerves watching, she was excited, too, because if this wound up working, then it was another scheme she could proudly count as a success. Amber and the delivery boy were hauling boxes onto a cart, and Louise thought that this was going to work, if only—  
  
"Lou _iiiiiise_!"  
  
The voice pierced the air like an arrow aimed directly for her eardrums. Louise shrieked, then clapped a hand over her mouth, turning just in time to fling her hand out to clap it over Millie's, as well; at some point, her nemesis had apparently materialized out of thin air behind her, filling the remainder of the gap between the van and the wall.  
  
The _slap_ of Louise's hand as it sealed over the lower half of Millie's face was incredibly satisfying, but the damage had already been done. Both Ginny and Amber had gone still over by the truck and were staring in the direction of the van and the wall. Although she was certain that they still couldn't see them, Millie _had_ shrieked her name, and Louise's heart was beating so fast she thought she might pass out. Millie stood patiently with Louise's hand over her mouth, her eyes wide and sparkling, her hands balled into fists in front of her— not in an aggressive manner, but in a way that suggested that she was about to start fist-pumping and dancing.  
  
God, Louise hated her.  
  
"Miss Belcher?" Ginny's voice floated over sharply.  
  
Louise slowly withdrew her hand from Millie's mouth, glaring at her with all of the hate she could muster before she stepped out from the wall to expose herself. "Hey!" she warbled, trying to think fast.  
  
Everyone was staring at her. Amber was peering at her suspiciously from behind a tower of boxes. Maybe she had noticed that there was an extra. Louise wasn't sure how she would get out of this one. Of _course_ Millie would choose the worst possible time to show her face again.  
  
"It's lunch time soon," said Ginny, but Louise knew that she wasn't saying this for her benefit. She was politely pointing out, _Why are you here?_  
  
"I started to," began Louise. "Uh." What could she claim here? Sickness? A bug bite? Maybe she spotted a bear? The bear thing sounded good. She straightened her shoulders. "I saw a—"  
  
She was abruptly cut off by Millie's arms around her waist and her chin on her shoulder. Louise's knees bent slightly, but she forced herself to keep standing even as every nerve in her body went on red alert. She suppressed the urge to scream. Millie was far too smart not to know that Louise had been spying because she was up to something. That was why she'd called her name and ruined everything. Millie was about to ruin everything.  
  
But all Millie said was, "We were playing tag!"  
  
Louise's head snapped to the side. She gawked at Millie for two solid seconds, disbelieving, before her survival instincts kicked in. She didn't know _why_ Millie was coming to her rescue like this, but she would have to investigate it later. Right now, she was being tossed a life preserver in the midst of drowning, and she wasn't stupid enough to push it away, even if Millie was on the other end of the rope.  
  
"Oh," said Ginny, and Louise thought that she wouldn't buy it, but then she smiled. "That's great. We really like to see inter-cabin relationships form!" The phrasing had a vaguely uncomfortable flavor to it, Louise decided.  
  
Millie was nodding, her head jerking like a toy on strings. "You're it!" she chirped at Louise, giving her a wallop over the back before she took off running. Louise didn't need to be told twice to maintain the show; she kicked up dust as she darted off after Millie, watching her blonde hair fan out behind her like a fluffy cloud as she ran.  
  
Millie sprinted towards the trees, and Louise followed, dodging rocks and branches. She chased Millie for about a minute before the girl in front of her came to an abrupt stop, digging in her heels and rounding upon Louise with a huge grin. The forest successfully obscured them from both Ginny and the delivery truck; Louise keeled over and panted, her hands on her knees.  
  
" _Damn_ you," she gurgled as soon as she was able, before she snapped up, clutching onto the nearest tree for support. Her lungs were searing hot with the effort of running. "What the _hell_ , Millie! What— the— hell!" She punctuated each word with a snap of her jaw. She imagined that she must look like an unhinged animal right now, snarls and all.  
  
Her nemesis was not out of breath at all. "What were you doing there spying on Ginny?" Millie asked innocently.  
  
Louise wanted to say _I wasn't spying_ , but she wasn't about to try something as stupid as attempting to pull the wool over Millie's sharp eyes. Louise knew better than that. "It's not important," she said.  
  
Millie's lips pursed, and she puffed out her cheeks in a way that worried Louise. "Does it have something to do with you and Jessica breaking into her office a few days ago?"  
  
Oh.  
  
"Fuck," croaked Louise.  
  
"Uh huh," said Millie solemnly, her head bouncing up and down. "Sooooo what's my cut?"  
  
"Hahahahaha," said Louise. "Nope. Not having this conversation." She turned to go, but it was mostly for show; she already knew that she would not be leaving without negotiating this situation.  
  
Millie's hand predictably locked onto her shoulder, stopping her. "Louise," she said, and she did not have to turn Louise around to get her to face her. Millie's face was guileless and welcoming, but there was real warning there. "Louise, you _know_ I adore you. Like, _soooo_ many good memories, you and I, right? Ha! So good! I am an irreplaceable part of your life, and you're pretty much, you know, an _institution_ in mine-"  
  
"Get to it." Louise stared right into her broadly smiling face.  
  
"You let me in _and_ give me a cut of whatever you're doing," said Millie, raising one finger, and then another. "And you go bug hunting with me." She lifted a third — her middle — finger.  
  
Louise had expected the first two, but the third threw her for a loop. "Bug hunting?" she repeated disbelievingly.  
  
"I'm really into entomology," said Millie, and Louise wasn't sure if she could believe her, but she looked enthusiastic enough. A creepy hobby like that kind of suited her. "And it'll be a fun way for us to spend time together and get along!"  
  
Finally the incredulity of it all was too much for Louise to handle. She tossed her arms into the air wildly. "Oh, _yeah_ , Millie!" she yelled. "Yeah, sounds _greaaaat!_ Crawling around in the dirt with you digging for bugs? That's _exactly_ what I _wanted_ , Millie, how did you _know!_ Dreams _do_ come true!"  
  
"Look, it's been hard for me," said Millie, leaning in close, the tip of her nose coming dangerously close to touching Louise's. "Watching you with your new bestie doing all that fun stuff together. But I realized that the key to getting along is to be more like her!"  
  
Louise's mind searched for what the hell that was supposed to mean. Wait. Jessica? Was Millie talking about Jessica?  
  
"So I'll just do whatever you want," said Millie gleefully.  
  
"First of all," started Louise with alarm. "Jessica doesn't just do whatever I want, okay?" She felt strangely defensive of her co-counselor. "And she's not my... my 'bestie', _god_ , do you have to use that term all the time? _Gross_. Plus, you're not even doing what you're saying you'll do! You're _blackmailing me_ right now, you pile of festering roadkill."  
  
"I mean," responded Millie, unfazed. "I'll do whatever you want. After you agree to my terms."  
  
"Oh my god!" Louise huffed. "That's _not_ how it _works_ , Millie!"  
  
But it _was_ how it worked, at least with Millie Frock, which was why Louise found herself standing with her by the delivery truck five minutes later after begrudgingly laying out the plans she'd made with Jessica and granting her twenty percent, a number that deeply pained her to relinquish. They had watched through the brush as Ginny and Amber left with their shipment and had rushed up to speak with the delivery boy before he climbed back into the seat.  
  
"Picking up for Alanis Alton," she said glumly. "I'm paying in cash."

  


•

 

Millie sat next to her, beaming smugly, all throughout lunch. Jessica and Vicky sat across the table, both of them staring at the sight of Millie's arm locked in Louise's, their hips bumping together.  
  
"You're sitting _way_ too close, _Millie_ ," ground out Louise. She lifted her spoon and stabbed it into Millie's potato salad. She had insisted on sharing a tray, and Louise, who was in no position to refuse, decided she would try to eat Millie's portion of lunch as well.  
  
"Isn't this nice! The four of us!" Millie trilled. "Sparkle! Twinkle! It really does all go together." Her head bobbed happily. "Tonight, we should all sneak out of our cabins after curfew and have a _bonfire_ , and we'll all share _secrets_."  
  
"We," began Vicky nervously, "we can't, I mean, we shouldn't, um, leave the cabins, I mean, we shouldn't leave the campers unattended at night?"  
  
Millie continued on like Vicky had not said a word. "Everyone bring their favorite animal!"  
  
Jessica's mouth had remained slightly open ever since she had first spotted Millie nuzzling up to Louise, but now it dropped further. "What?"  
  
"I like badgers," said Millie excitedly. "So I call that. What about everyone else?"  
  
"How are you going to—" sputtered Louise. " _What?_ "  
  
Vicky lowered her sandwich. "Okay, Millie," she said. Louise stared at her, wondering what plane of reality she was apparently on, before realizing that Vicky was simply taking the path of least resistance here: she was agreeing because it would sate Millie the fastest. Apparently, more than a week in a cabin with her had taught Vicky a few tricks.  
  
"Right," said Louise hastily. "Rabbit, then. I call rabbit."  
  
"I'll... decide later," said Jessica slowly, but she was staring right at Louise as she said it. Her plain gaze clearly asked, _What is going on?_ and Louise had no answers to give her. Not yet.  
  
Millie chose to do all of the explaining after lunch had come to an end, advising — really, commanding — Vicky to go ahead to meet their campers for that afternoon's scheduled activities. She let go of Louise's arm, which had by now fallen asleep, and looked between her and Jessica, smiling more widely than ever. "So Louise told me _all_ about your thing. You know, your plan? That thing."  
  
"She caught me," Louise said apologetically. "As I was picking up the delivery."  
  
Something cleared in Jessica's expression, as if a great deal of things had suddenly become obvious to her all at once. "Right," she said. "Ha." She was toneless.  
  
"Millie gets twenty percent," said Louise, and it pained her to say it— literally. She could feel herself seizing up all over, like a full-body cramp. She worried that she would shrivel up like an abandoned tomato that had rolled under the grill. "She'll help us with sales... I guess." She wasn't sure just how much she could count on Millie to do any work.  
  
"That's... great," said Jessica. She seemed distracted, somehow— even more monotonous than ever. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "I've got to go pick up mail from Ginny," she said, looking at Louise. "Do you mind going ahead and grabbing the girls?"  
  
An opportunity to leave immediately was being extended to her, and Louise snatched at it. "Yeah," she said, lighting up a little. Her eyes flicked across the mess hall towards the campers of Twinkle Cabin gathered at their table. "Volleyball, right? I can handle that." Louise didn't know how to play volleyball, not exactly, but she was counting on the kids not knowing how to, either. "You can just meet us at the court."  
  
"We'll all get together later today," vowed Millie, putting a hand on both Jessica's and Louise's shoulders. "To discuss our business, right?"  
  
"Right," said Jessica flatly.  
  
"Favorite animal," said Millie, her voice sweetly shrill as she leaned close into Jessica's face. She reached up to flick her forehead. "Think about it!"  
  
Then, with a twirl, she was off, laughing wildly.

  


•

 

Jessica showed up at the volleyball court more than half an hour later. By that time, Louise had reconfigured the game into dodgeball, which the girls seemed to be enjoying slightly more than practicing spikes. She was sitting off to the side, gnawing on the end of a straw stuck in a juice box, when Jessica entered. She dropped her backpack to the hardwood as she took a seat next to Louise.  
  
Louise thought that she might have something vaguely sardonic to say about the way she had changed the activity, but Jessica just watched the game quietly, and Louise began to wonder if she was angry about the fact that she'd been caught by Millie. It didn't seem like something that should really bother Jessica, and so her sudden cold shoulder startled Louise somewhat- and then instilled a great deal of worry in her. She wavered between feeling offended and feeling apologetic, and tried to think of a way to explain what had happened, wanting to justify the whole mess to her.  
  
She still hadn't decided on how she would approach it by the time the buzzer sounded, indicating that their time on the court was over. Jessica stood and moved without comment to help usher the girls into the changing room.  
  
Louise had showered early that morning, and she hadn't participated in any of the attempts at volleyball and dodgeball, so she hovered back, by the lockers, as the girls scattered for the shower stalls. She spent about five minutes trying to put Marie's combination into her lock for her, both of them muttering in frustration. By the time Louise had gotten it right, her fingers had cramped up.  
  
With the girls in the showers, Louise now faced down the task of apologizing to her business partner slash co-counselor slash... friend? It was a weird thing to think, a label she didn't slap down on just about anyone, but the fact that she felt the need to apologize to Jessica at all said more than enough about the title she had unconsciously stuck onto her.  
  
She found Jessica by the wastebasket against the wall, staring down into it. It struck Louise as strange, but Jessica was a little bit strange in her own esoteric way, so it didn't bother her that much. She wrenched her hands together and cleared her throat to get her attention.  
  
"I know Millie's a pain in the ass, and working with her is like signing a contract with the devil," she began. She'd never been great at apologies. Somewhere, in the back of her mind, Louise could hear Tina groaning. "And that's my ffffff.... fuh..." She slurred the word, her tongue turning gelatinous in her mouth. "F...aaauuulllttt...." she forced out. "My fault." There. She had pole-vaulted elegantly right over that hurdle. "I'm... _ugh_... sorry. I should have been more careful. But her cut's coming out of _my_ percent, not yours. Which..." At this, Louise smiled. "It puts us even in the end. Like, you get forty, I get forty, Millie gets twenty. See? That's karma biting _my_ ass, and you're free to say that I deserve it, 'cause I totally do."  
  
Anticipating some sort of biting or playful response from Jessica, Louise allowed her time to respond— to banter with her, as she had become accustomed to. But all Jessica did was stare at her silently, her lips pressed together, and then she said, "It's fine."  
  
Something felt very, very off. Louise's smile faded. She'd apologized, so why did Jessica still look so frigid? Sure, falling victim to Millie was bad, but was it really _this_ bad? "Uh..."  
  
"Hey," said Jessica. "I'm going to go ahead and get us set up outside on the track field." And then, without another word, she was hauling her backpack onto one shoulder and striding out of the changing room.  
  
Louise watched her go in disbelief, feeling strangely hurt. She took a step back, and her hip thudded against the wastebasket. She flicked her eyes down to it momentarily, then looked away— until something clicked in her head, something unusual she had seen in there, and she looked back into it.  
  
Wedged between the paper towels and tissues were a couple of envelopes. Unable to withhold her sticky fingers, and because she was now alone in the changing room anyway, Louise reached in and plucked them free.  
  
The envelopes were addressed to a name she recognized right away. _Jessica Sievers_. She looked at the embossed sticker that proclaimed the return address on one of them; it had a ridiculously tacky picture of a kitten nestled among flowers, but more importantly, it bore the names _Neil and Tamara Sievers_.  
  
She didn't have to do much guesswork to assume that these were the names of Jessica's parents. Louise hesitated as she held the envelopes. Both were neatly ripped open at one end, and when she stared into the open ends she could see that the letters were still inside. She slipped a thumb inside one and tugged a letter free. It was folded into thirds; she could see a faint trace of the handwriting showing through the outside of the paper. Her stomach roiled.  
  
_I could read it,_ she thought. _Why not? I'd read anyone's mail if I found it. I was opening the Pestos' mail for years. This is already open. It was thrown away._  
  
But Louise already knew, even before these thoughts, that she could not and would not do it. She could not bring herself to open the letters and read them, even though a part of her was dying to know what they said. She would not violate Jessica's trust, even if Jessica would never know.  
  
Strangely enough, Louise felt an immense relief as she stuffed the envelopes back into the wastebasket, burying them deep beneath the paper towels. She knew that she had done the right thing by not reading them, but, above that, she knew acutely that she'd never really considered doing it at all.  
  
Louise wasn't stupid. It wasn't difficult to draw a conclusion between Jessica's strange mood and the letters she was throwing away. It had nothing, or mostly nothing, to do with Millie after all, so in that respect, a few of Louise's questions had been answered. But now another hovered uneasily before her: _Why?_

  


•

 

There was a lot that Louise had to say about sports, and most of it was stunningly negative. But she hadn't yet watched Jessica on the tennis court, and there was something about the ease with which she darted back and forth that almost made the whole thing look fun and worth a try. She stared as Jessica volleyed with her partner, a counselor from Star Cabin who wore her old Thundergirls badges pinned all over her uniform like chainmail armor. Jessica stayed close to the net, her typically expressionless face sharp and focused, her long legs flexing hard beneath her loose shorts as she made neat moves to meet the ball.  
  
Louise remembered that when she started high school, her mother had begged her to pursue an extracurricular, insisting on a sport ('Preferably cheerleading,' Linda had said). Louise had been way ahead of her on that point- she had already watched Tina stomp around with the rugby players and Gene struggle to start a tetherball team, and neither seemed to have had much fun doing it. In the end, she signed up for the art club, where she was able to peacefully sculpt many an obscene vase for the restaurant.  
  
She had never really wanted to try any sport out, much less tennis, but she found herself wishing she could trade shots with Jessica anyway.  
  
When the match ended, the Twinkle Cabin girls threw up a cheer. Louise joined in belatedly, clapping her hands against her knees. Jessica moved back to sit with them as the next pair took the court. Ginny had decided that in an effort to keep racking up points in various sports, counselors would be participating for their cabins as well. There would be no prize at the end of the camp term apart from ribbons. Louise had checked herself out the moment she'd heard the word 'participation'.  
  
Across the court Millie motioned excitedly, trying to catch Louise's attention by waving both arms, her face lit up in its usual mad grin. Louise did not return the wave. Instead, she turned to Jessica, telling herself to be normal. She was going to carry on as though she had never uncovered the letters... But she also wanted to let Jessica know that she had noticed her change in mood. Louise was not used to such gestures. She did not often extend the hand of friendship, preferring to keep her cards close, so she struggled with how to approach the whole thing. But she would try anyway with her usual brand of bullheaded insistence.  
  
"You make it look easy," said Louise as mildly as she could, offering a sort of half grin.  
  
"It kind of is," said Jessica with a shrug. "I mean, because I've been playing it for so long."  
  
"I bet being tall helps," Louise prompted.  
  
"I wouldn't know." For the first time that day Jessica smiled slightly, and she moved to stand. "I'm going to go refill my water bottle."  
  
Louise leapt to her feet. She could practically feel her knees locking into place. "I'll go too!" she said, perhaps a bit too loudly and abruptly, because both Violet and Sydney ceased their conversation about Chariot's ascension to Princess of Pegatropolis in the latest Equestranauts episode to stare at her.  
  
She trailed Jessica past the court and to the water fountain against the wall beyond the spectators' seating area. Jessica hadn't asked why Louise had chosen to follow her, given that she had no water bottle of her own to fill, but she said nothing. She stood with the lip of her bottle pressed below the stream and waited as it filled. Louise hovered awkwardly. It did not take long for her to reach a point of complete impatience with the silence: approximately fifteen seconds.  
  
"So, Newspaper. Not to make things weird, but," began Louise uncomfortably. "I noticed that maybe, like, if you wanna talk about something, I'm, uh... You know. I got ears." Feeling idiotic, she reached up and wrapped both hands around her rabbit ears, holding them up straight. "Or, I mean, if it's the Millie thing, like I said, that _was_ my fault, and you can yell at me about it."  
  
Jessica straightened, screwing the cap back on her water bottle. She looked at Louise in silence, and after a moment, she appeared to ease, almost imperceptibly.  
  
"Yeah," she said. "Thanks." She wiped the wetness off the outside of her bottle off on her shirt, her gaze flicking beyond Louise's shoulder. "I've got another match after this one ends. You have to shore up the cheering part, you know." She gave Louise's shoulder a nudge, and then she was breezing past her towards the court once more, leaving Louise standing there.  
  
Louise had expected to feel slightly better after attempting to reach out to Jessica, but instead she found herself frustrated once more. Jessica had relinquished nothing to her. There was no transparency to what she had said. Just a _yeah_ , followed by changing the topic. What was Louise supposed to make of that? Did Jessica not trust her? Or maybe she felt that it was just none of her business?  
  
She would not have cared if it were any other person. If she'd said to Gene, _Look, you can talk to me about whatever's got you writing sad tuba songs at four in the morning,_ and he'd refused, that would have been alright with her, because she knew that he would tell her eventually when he was ready. And it wouldn't have mattered much if it were any of the people she loosely termed friends— or as close to it as she could get at school.  
  
But it was different here. Louise found herself thinking back to the folder of Boo Boo photos on her phone, and how staring at his face made her want to slap him, which in turn made her feel better about things in general. But thinking about that didn't offer much relief here. Boo Boo's infuriatingly adorable face held no solutions for her problem.  
  
Instead, she imagined the conversation she'd just had with Jessica playing out differently, with Louise slapping some... Some sense into her. Yeah. That was it. Slapping sense into her.  
  
In her head, she could hear Tina's voice again, but she wasn't groaning this time. She was saying, _Whoa. You got it bad, girl._  
  
" _No way_ ," said Louise aloud, her voice cracking. She stuck her head in the fountain, hat and all. By the time she had cooled off and was back in her seat with her bunny ears dripping, she had already dismissed the thought.

  


•

 

A cupcake was slammed into Louise's mouth the moment she stepped out of the mess hall the next day.  
  
" _WHAT'S UP?!_ " Millie shouted exuberantly. Her hand mashed the cupcake against Louise's lips.  
  
It was too early in the morning for this.  
  
" _Mil_ lie! Fuck!" Louise screamed as best as she could through a mouthful of frosting. She reached out to try to shove Millie away, sputtering chocolate cake everywhere. The remainder of the cupcake dropped to the ground, where it rolled in the dirt. It was a sorry sight, but not as sorry as Millie was about to be. Louise tried to give her a shove; Millie sidestepped it expertly.  
  
"When's your birthday, Louise?" Millie cooed. "Just kidding! I know it's next month! It's too bad it's not _this_ month, when we could celebrate right here at camp, you know? But it gives me more time to think about the present I'm going to get you."  
  
Louise angrily wiped frosting off of her mouth and chin with the back of her hand, which she then smeared onto her shorts. "You can't just go running _up_ to me like that and _shoving_ —" She tried to kick Millie's shin. "— _things_ in my _face_ —" When Millie danced back, she stomped at her foot. Although she succeeded, Millie barely winced.  
  
"You know what today is!" Millie said with immeasurable joy. It was then that Louise noticed that she was wearing her backpack and that there was a net stuck through the belt loops of her shorts. "We're going—"  
  
"No," said Louise with dread.  
  
"Bug—"  
  
"No." Louise began backing away.  
  
"Hunting!"  
  
Scrambling for excuses, Louise took another step back even as Millie advanced on her. "There are things we have to do today, Millie! This is freaking, I don't know, _ugh_ , like, music day, isn't it? We have to be with our cabins."  
  
"It's okay," said Millie brightly. "I arranged for our cabins to do it together... and Vicky's not going to say anything about us skipping to Ginny. Will _Jessica?_ " She gave the latter name an inflection that Louise didn't particularly like the sound of.  
  
"Of course not," Louise snorted as confidently as she could. She was sure that Jessica wouldn't, especially because they were all reluctant partners now. Of course, being in a position where she had to strive to keep Millie in line was a literal living nightmare, but she knew a dead end when she saw one. She would have to concede for now. Eventually, she would come up with a suitable revenge to retaliate from the corner Millie had backed her into, but for now, it was best to cooperate.  
  
"Come on," urged Millie. "Time to get a move on, Louise!" She reached out for Louise's hand; when she jerked it away, Millie settled for holding her by the elbow.  
  
Millie was apparently dead serious about her bug collecting aspirations. Half an hour later Louise was on her hands and knees in the grass and dirt right alongside her nemesis, who was more than prepared for the activity; she had given Louise a jar decorated with stickers and glitter puff paint spelling her name on the side. Millie's own jar matched it perfectly, right down to the heart rhinestones she'd used to dot the _i_ s in both of their names.  
  
The pink jar belonging to Millie was already occupied by several ladybugs and beetles. What she really wanted, she had explained to Louise, was a caterpillar moth. Louise, who had thus far stuck to the easiest thing, plucking ants off the ground and putting them in her jar, was not actively looking out for anything in particular.  
  
"Can't you have a _normal_ hobby?" she growled, dragging her fingers through the dirt. "Can't you just, I don't know, _be normal?_ "  
  
"Oh, Louise!" laughed Millie. She had a small trowel and was using the edge of it to comb through the grass. "After we're done, we're going to do what _you_ want to do."  
  
"Jump off a bridge?" Louise asked hopefully.  
  
"No, funny bunny!" Millie set her trowel down and crawled across the grass to meet her gaze. Louise felt ridiculous. They probably looked like a couple of dogs down here in the dirt. She was glad that no one knew where they were or what they were up to. "We're going to make money."  
  
"Oh," said Louise. "Well, you're right. I _would_ pay you to eat the contents of your jar right now."  
  
"Not _that!_ " Millie picked up her trowel again and poked Louise in the shoulder with the tip. Louise frowned, rubbing the spot. "We're going to drop in on Flower Cabin. Today's their free time slot, so I think it's the perfect time to make some sales."  
  
Louise carefully picked an ant up between two fingers and deposited it in her jar. She already planned to 'accidentally' knock it over and free them all before they left this spot. At Millie's proposal, she froze. The ant crawled over her wrist, vying for escape. "Uh, Millie? The idea was to sell to _our_ cabin. And yours, since I guess you're in on this now. I mean, I have to make sure the kids don't _squeal_. Can't be sure of that if we're not their counselors. We don't even know who's in charge of Flower Cabin. What if they tell?"  
  
"They won't," said Millie calmly. Louise did not like her tone. It was _too_ calm.  
  
"Whatever you're thinking..." Louise began, feeling the muscles under her eyes twitch.  
  
"I've got e _vvvv_ erything under control," Millie went on slowly. " _Everything_. You don't have to worry about a _thing_ , Louise. I'd _never_ let you worry!"  
  
Looking at her, Louise decided that the only thing Millie would have to do to the campers of Flower Cabin to ensure that they would not tattle was stare at them with those ominous eyes of hers. Maybe Millie was useful for something after all.  
  
"We're partners in this, after all," continued Millie, smiling. She flipped her trowel over and began to sing quietly beneath her breath. " _Mil_ lie and Lou _ise_ , _Mil_ lie and Lou _ise_..."  
  
Deeply unsettled by this, Louise decided to blurt out, "Son of a bitch! Is that a caterpillar moth?"  
  
"Where?!" Millie's head whipped up, her curls flying.  
  
"Oh," said Louise. "He flew away."  
  
Millie stared at her. "They don't fly," she said after a long stretch of silence.  
  
Shit. Louise recoiled with dread. "I must have gotten confused," she said numbly, which wasn't really a lie, but she knew that this would not work on Millie.  
  
But whatever she had been expecting, it wasn't Millie's next squeal. She had turned towards a tree and was leaning close to the bark. "Oh!" She reached out and plucked something off of the trunk, her smile growing impossibly wider. Louise thought that her mouth might eventually expand so much that the top half of her head would just fall open and tip right over. "I see it! Here, Louise!"  
  
A furry red and black caterpillar was placed on her lap. Its legs tickled her thigh. At that moment, Louise deeply regretted a lot of things, but mostly she regretted Millie Frock's existence.  
  
"Aw, _SICK!_ "

  


•

 

It turned out that Millie was an adept salesgirl, a fact that should not have surprised Louise as much as it did. Millie even hauled the box containing their stash around, happy to bear it. Her luminously eerie smile was probably a large part of why no one asked either of them any questions. They found the campers of Flower Cabin in the arts and crafts building, where they were assembling paper cutouts. Millie stomped right in and upturned the box onto the table they were all clustered around. The children watched with awe as snacks rained out of it.  
  
They left with a twenty dollar profit off of the sale of only a handful of items. Louise hadn't considered that most of it would be in coins, but money was money, and it made it simpler to divide, anyway. She actually felt pretty pleased with Millie's performance, and although she could not stand her or the time she was being forced to spend with her, she was unable to hold back a smile as they walked back towards Twinkle Cabin.  
  
"Not bad, Millie," said Louise with some difficulty. Credit was owed where credit was due.  
  
"My mother says I'm very persuasive," said Millie, bouncing the box in her arms. She gave Louise an adoring look. "Isn't it so much fun hanging out and doing things together? We're like Thelma and Louise! I'm not sure who would be Thelma, and who would be Louise, but—"  
  
"I haven't seen the movie," said Louise, "but my name is _literally_ Louise, so maybe it makes sense if I was, like... you know. The character named Louise."  
  
"Hmmmmm," said Millie doubtfully.  
  
They had come up to Twinkle Cabin, and Louise held out one arm for the box. In the other she held a fistful of coins. "Your cut."  
  
"You're not going to invite me in?" Millie asked, swaying on her heels and widening her eyes even as she swapped the box for the coins.  
  
"No way," said Louise with a laugh, and then, mostly insincerely, she added, "Maybe another day."  
  
"I get it." Millie tossed the coins from hand to hand, then began sliding them down the front of her shirt— into her bra, presumably, which was weird, but not entirely surprising, if Louise had to be brutally honest. "You haven't cleaned up yet, and you'd be embarrassed if your bestie saw your bed unmade. That's cool, Louise! _Another_ day." She said the latter two words with a great deal of determination, then swung around to leave. "See you at dinner!"  
  
Louise watched her go, letting out the breath she had been holding in a long shudder. She checked the time on her phone. She was startled to see that she had passed two hours with Millie; it hadn't felt nearly that long. She dragged herself into the cabin with the box under her arm. She found the campers inside, scrambling around from bed to bed and dresser to dresser, at various stages of being ready for dinner. Louise wove unsuccessfully between them, trying to move to the back towards her own bed.  
  
"Where were you?" June asked her, her head half-sticking out of her shirt. Her visor had been knocked askew. Absently, Louise reached out to set it right on top of her head. "We learned so many new songs today!"  
  
"Uh... important Thundergirls Big Sister stuff," said Louise, hoping that this sounded plausible enough.  
  
Georgia was trying to drag a brush through her hair. She gave a displeased wail when it got stuck; Marie moved to help her. "We missed you, Louise," said Georgia, wincing as Marie yanked the brush free of the tangles.  
  
"You'll sing with us after dinner, right?" Marie asked from over Georgia's shoulder.  
  
Louise was stunned to realize that she was slightly touched that they had not only noticed her absence, but missed her, as well. She squirmed uncomfortably. She had never been good around children, not even when they had been her peers, and so she didn't know what to say. Mostly she wanted to punch herself in the face for feeling even a fraction moved by any of this. "Yeah," she said finally. "You bet. We'll all sing after dinner. I'll teach you guys, uh, I don't know." She thought for a moment. "Sleater-Kinney. Come up with a Sleater-Kinney song you want to learn. Remind me later." She swiftly moved around the children and towards the back.  
  
She could hear the girls talking quietly among themselves, confused. "What's Sleater-Kinney?"  
  
Jessica was sitting on the top bunk when Louise made it to the back. She ducked low to shove the stash box beneath the bed, then grabbed onto the ladder and hoisted herself up a couple of steps so she could peer at Jessica. She'd changed out of her uniform into more casual clothes. A book was open on her lap.  
  
"So how'd it go with Millie?" she asked. "Vicky told me she had you kidnapped."  
  
" _Ugh,_ " said Louise. She pulled her weight up on the ladder and leaned over Jessica's bed. "She's crazy. She had me crawling in the dirt with her for an hour. She didn't really try to pull anything, which I'm sure is her way of trying to get me to put my guard down, but no way in hell is that going to happen."  
  
"Did you sell anything?"  
  
"Oh, yeah." Louise dug in her pocket and dropped a waterfall of quarters onto the bed sheets. "Here you go. Your cut's eight bucks on Flower Cabin."  
  
Jessica leaned over to push the coins into a pile. "You've got to let me tag along next time," she said, and Louise thought she could read something slightly chastising in her tone, but because Jessica's voice was usually so level, it was hard to be completely sure. She pushed herself up and took a seat on the bed, her bunny ears touching the ceiling, as Jessica added, "It's going to damage my reputation if I start getting jealous of Millie."  
  
"Jealous?" echoed Louise, bewildered and, suddenly, slightly embarrassed. She all at once wished she hadn't climbed up to sit so close to Jessica. She folded her legs underneath herself and tried to look surly. At least Jessica did not seem as distant as she had yesterday; that fact alone warmed Louise, instilling a strange sense of gratitude in her. "Why would you be jealous? I don't even _like_ Millie."  
  
The book on Jessica's lap was flipped closed and put off to the side. She began counting out the coins, and spoke to Louise while staring down at them. "So that means you like me," said Jessica. "I'm putting that on my résumé."  
  
The words echoed in Louise's head. Not the thing about the résumé, but the _you like me_ part. Louise never readily admitted to even the slightest fond inclination for anyone unless she was under extreme duress. She could count the times she'd said 'I love you' to her family in the past year on one hand. _You like me_ , Jessica had said, and she made it sound so easy, like it was some kind of simple thing that didn't need justifying, or excusing. Louise knew that she was allowing her thoughts to ricochet in directions that Jessica likely did not intend, but her uneasiness only increased.  
  
Louise's hands twitched, her wrists flexing sharply. "It just means that I hate Millie!" she yelped.  
  
"I'll take that." Jessica flicked a quarter at her. "I'm still putting it on my résumé. ' _Louise doesn't hate me._ '"  
  
Louise reached up to catch the quarter. She could feel that her cheeks had grown slightly hot. "That's pretty presumptuous, Mailbox."  
  
"You haven't really denied it," Jessica pointed out. "Hey, I've got something you can put on _your_ résumé."  
  
"Yeah? Mine's kind of pathetic, so I don't see how virtually anything else would fail to improve it."  
  
There was a small pause, and then Jessica said, "I think I'll miss you when this thing is over."  
  
That remark was so unexpected that Louise was left wordless, struck by the suddenness of it. It occurred to her for the first time that they were nearly at the halfway point of their time at the camp; by Louise's quick mental calculations, there were eleven days left. She was startled to realize that the number felt alarmingly small. She stared into Jessica's neutral face, blinking rapidly, and all at once Louise wanted to demand to know where she got the nerve to say things like that out of virtually nowhere. Saying _I'll miss you_ felt too blunt, even for Louise, who abided by a strict personal policy of being as abrasively, brutally honest as she could at all times.  
  
But in eleven days, she would be on her way home, and in twelve, she'd be back at the restaurant in the thick of summer, and it would feel like she had never left. She would see her mother and father again, and she would catch up with Tina, and she'd be able to see Gene before he left for Thailand. Life would go back to normal. Her father was likely to lay down a contract asking her to never leave the restaurant alone for three weeks in a row ever again, because surely the place was going to pieces without her. In eleven days, Jessica would be back in Wellington, far upstate. Coincidence had brought her back into Louise's life, but now for the first time she realized that it would pull her out of it, too.  
  
A bitterness welled up in her chest, a strange combination of resentment and longing for a thing she had not even lost yet.  
  
She thought back to Jessica's hands clasping her own on the zipline tower and about the way her fingertips had brushed her leg when they had been sitting on the dock together. She thought about the way the sunset had thrown golds and purples onto Jessica's face as they sat on the shore of the lake a week ago. She thought about Jessica saying, _You were just sitting here all alone_ , like it had mattered to her that Louise should have some company. She thought about how being around Jessica made her feel disarmed, undefended— made her want to spill her guts out all over the floor.  
  
Louise fought to work up a response beyond the already awkward delay. "I think I'll miss you too," she finally said. Her heart felt like it had skipped not just a beat but an entire song.  
  
Feeling the little Tina voice in her head start humming again, it was hard to keep looking Jessica in the eyes, so she stared down at the bed sheets. This was, by far, the most awkward Louise had ever felt in her entire life. For all of her brusque confidence, she was very good at one thing: avoidance. It was something she most commonly applied to the people in her life, but its true function had always been in her own head. Louise was very talented at not acknowledging anything that was beyond her comfortable, isolated emotional boundaries. She was _too_ talented at it, she knew, because it often backfired on her. It was backfiring now, forcing her to stare down the crux of the mess in her head.  
  
Jessica laughed softly. Louise couldn't bring herself to glance up and try to figure out why, although she wanted to. "What's that look for?" Louise could see her move slightly closer.  
  
Damn it. What was it about Jessica that apparently rendered Louise so transparent, when she herself was so opaque? Before Louise could come up with an adequate retort, she was saved by a familiar burst of static that brought even the chatter in the next room to a halt.  
  
The loudspeaker shrieked to life, and Ginny's voice was suddenly reverberating through the very walls. "Can everyone please report to the fire pit within the next fifteen minutes?"  
  
_Ginny, you incredible son of a bitch,_ Louise thought with awe and delight. She sat up, reaching for both the ladder and the change of topic. "We'd better go," she said cheerfully.  
  
Jessica shoved the loose change into her pockets and put her book away. "Right with you," she said. "By the way, I need that quarter back."  
  
Louise tossed it at her face as she descended.

  


•

 

Ginny had never before called a camp-wide meeting so close to dinner time before, although the fire pit was the typical meeting place for other things, like morning greetings and relaying information on sporting events. Louise waded through the crowd at Jessica's elbow, sticking close, if only because Jessica was tall enough that she was easy to follow among the thick rows of staff and campers.  
  
Once Ginny had managed to reach a sustainable level of quiet, she offered the crowd a smile. "We're nearly at our midpoint," she said, her eyes bright. "And I must say that you've all been so incredible. We've truly been flourishing! It's incredible to see the Thundergirls ideals so proud and so strong in all of you—"  
  
Louise mentally checked out the moment Ginny hit the words _Thundergirls ideals_ , and the camp director's voice turned into a low, incomprehensible drone as she skimmed her gaze over the crowd. Millie stood a few paces away with Vicky. She waved to Louise, who offered her a vague jerk of her chin. This seemed to be more than enough to satisfy Millie, who just began gesturing more enthusiastically and making several unidentifiable shapes with her hands. Louise chose to draw the conclusion that she was communicating in the language of whatever freakish alien species had dropped her onto Earth in the first place.  
  
"—and that's why we'll be putting on a play on our last night here at the camp," said Ginny, snapping Louise's attention back like a rubber band. The crowd buzzed excitedly.  
  
A snort escaped her, loud and disbelieving. She looked up at Jessica. "A _play?_ "  
  
"It does seem a little strange to spring this on us now." Jessica's arms were crossed, a hand poised thoughtfully on her chin.  
  
"Counselors," continued Ginny, "will be expected to participate in operational roles."  
  
"No way," muttered Louise. "I did _not_ come here to reenact Broadway with eight year olds."  
  
At the end of her announcement, Ginny sent off the campers along with the administrative staff to the mess hall. She kept the counselors near the fire pit, walking among them with her clipboard. Louise was ready to burst at the seams with hunger. She stood there, antsy, as Ginny noted down which roles they might be interested in taking to help organize the performance.  
  
"None," said Louise politely when Ginny approached her.  
  
Ginny sighed. "Miss Belcher, I appreciate that this sort of thing probably does not align with your personal interests. However, I do have to put you down for _something_."  
  
Beside her, Jessica spoke. "I want to be the director."  
  
Both Louise and Ginny now turned to stare at her. "What?" Louise asked, as Ginny said, "It's a lot of work. Do you have a second preference?"  
  
Jessica tilted her head. "I don't mind. I'd be happy to sit down with you and discuss your vision." Then she smiled— neatly, presentably. Louise was slightly intimidated.  
  
This had worked perfectly on Ginny, who looked very pleased. "Then I'll certainly mark you down," she said. "No one else has stepped up for the position." She smiled at Jessica with some fondness — an expression Louise had never seen on her face before — and then looked to Louise once more. "How about it, Miss Belcher?"  
  
Millie bounded up to them. Apparently, she had been listening, and now she slid smoothly into both the conversation and in between Louise and Jessica where they were standing. "Louise can join me as a costume designer!"  
  
Unable to withstand the thought of being alone with Millie any more than necessary, especially not in a scenario that could potentially involve sewing needles, Louise blurted out the first thing that came to mind. "Keyboard!"  
  
"Keyboard?" echoed Ginny and Millie at the same time.  
  
"Keyboard," said Louise again, her jaw twitching. "Music. A play needs music, right? Look, I'm not great, but I can stab out some songs. My brother taught me." This was not a lie; she knew a handful of things from Gene, who was passionate enough about his pursuit of music that it was hard _not_ to pick up a little bit of it. Louise wasn't very confident about her ability to improvise, or to branch out of the few songs she knew, but right now it was the only thing she could think of to avoid working with Millie.  
  
Ginny seemed to think about it for a moment, and then she was lowering her pen to her clipboard. "I believe that will be workable," she said. Louise allowed herself to relax as Ginny excused herself and walked away.  
  
Millie seemed vaguely disappointed, but only for a few seconds. She threw her arms around both Louise and Jessica's waists. "Isn't this going to be fun?! We all get to spend even more time together!" she said, somewhat manically.  
  
The one advantage Louise was absolutely certain that she had over Millie was her height; Millie was even shorter than she was. That was what allowed her to look straight over her head and up at Jessica, who was giving her an understanding look. Jessica flicked her eyes down to Millie, and then rolled them, and in that moment Louise knew that she'd never been jealous in the first place, and that she knew there'd never been any reason to be.


	6. there's something going on here

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, with this chapter, we've crested the hill on this thing and reached the midpoint! I'm really glad that we're at the heart of the fic now, because this is where things kick up a little. That said, this chapter is a little lengthier than the ones before it, so I thank you for bearing with me here.
> 
> As a halfway-through bonus, here's a little thing some of you might be interested in: this story has some awesome art to accompany it now! [Check it out here](http://tinyurl.com/pn7w89m) if you'd like to see Louise and Jessica as depicted in this fic.

Louise had begun to reconsider her decision to play the keyboard for the play.  
  
Firstly, the play hardly qualified as a play. As she quickly learned, the performance was a stage adaptation of an old Thundergirls legend-slash-song: _Penny-Anne, The Thundergirl Who Never Gave Up_. Louise wasn't sure if something that had been invented less than fifteen years ago qualified as a legend, but Ginny said that it did, and that the story was a huge part of the inherent Thundergirls identity, so she managed to keep her mouth shut.  
  
("What is it about?" Millie had asked, puzzled, as Ginny handed out the scripts to the production crew.  
  
"I have a feeling it's about a Thundergirl named Penny-Anne who never gives up," said Louise seriously.  
  
"How did you know?" Ginny asked, pleased.)  
  
Secondly, she flat out couldn't play the keyboard. Louise sat in the recreational hall in front of a brand new keyboard, playing one of the three songs Gene had taught her. Counselors from other cabins worked in teams, poring over set designs and costuming decisions (more than once Louise could hear Millie cackling as she poked someone, usually Vicky, with a pin). Louise was not having much success at her station.  
  
She slammed her hands down on the keyboard. Ginny's dog, who was resting at her feet, lifted his head and whined sharply at the commotion.  
  
"I _know,_ Mopsy!" Louise said hopelessly. "I know."  
  
Jessica strode over, cringing. She had a script clutched in her hands and two highlighters tucked into the pocket on her uniform shirt. Louise had teased her yesterday about signing on as director, but Jessica had been insistent that it was a role that she actually wanted to see through. Somehow, Louise felt as though she were regretting it today. Jessica spoke cautiously. "You were doing okay up until that last part. But wasn't that the beat to _California Love_? Like... 2Pac?"  
  
"Yes," said Louise bluntly. "It's the third song Gene taught me."  
  
"Really," said Jessica. "What were the first two?"  
  
"Uhhh." Louise stared down at the keys. "You ever seen the Keyboard Cat video?"  
  
Jessica grimaced. "I'm not sure if we can put on _Penny-Anne_ with those two things as our soundtrack."  
  
"Fuck," gurgled Louise. "You're telling me." Logically she knew she should be able to put together the ability to play other songs based on what she already knew, but she had learned by watching and memorizing. Gene hadn't actually filled her in on what any of the keys meant or how they aligned, probably because it wasn't something he cared for himself.  
  
A hand reached down to gently cup her shoulder. Louise's stomach did a half-turn as she looked up at Jessica, who was smiling. Her stomach had been doing that a lot lately around her co-counselor. It was becoming a veritable gymnast. "It's fine," said Jessica. "Soon-Mi knows how to play, too." Her hand moved away.  
  
Louise could still feel the weight of Jessica's hand against her shoulder. She asked, somewhat belatedly, "Um— who's, uh, Soon-Mi?"  
  
"That's Vicky's first name," said Jessica, glancing over to where the Sparkle Cabin counselors were deciding between two brightly colored cottons. Millie was waving pair of scissors around like a sword, and Vicky was leaning away from them, obviously terrified.  
  
Feeling affronted that Jessica was apparently on a first-name basis with Vicky, Louise reddened, a bizarre mixture of frustration and jealousy rocking through her— feelings she typically reserved for special occasions, like when sending hate mail to the comic book store that had denied her a reserve on a limited edition _Hawk and Chick_ commemorative placard. "No way," said Louise, irritated. "I can do it, okay?"  
  
Jessica gave her a somewhat puzzled look; Louise couldn't exactly fault her for her confusion, because she'd snapped at her pretty abruptly. "Alright," she said. "Keep me posted." And then she was walking away. Louise stared after her.  
  
Truthfully, Louise had begun feeling weirder and weirder around Jessica with each passing hour. The kickoff point of those uncomfortable feelings had been two days ago, when she'd been sitting on Jessica's bed with her, and Jessica had said, _I think I'll miss you when this thing is over_ , and there had been... Well, there had been _something_ there. Louise just wasn't sure _what_. The constant proximity to Jessica wasn't exactly helping matters, either. They slept on the same bunk bed, shared a bathroom, ate the same meals, and attended basically every daily event together as co-counselors. The constant exposure to Jessica compounded with the bizarre feelings she refused to acknowledge had begun to drive Louise slightly insane.  
  
She knew exactly what her older sister and brother would have to say if they were here. Tina had been with the same boy since middle school, and Gene was no stranger to relationships. The both of them would certainly shove the whole thing in her face.  
  
But that was impossible. For one, Louise was self-determined as functionally aromantic and asexual for years. Boo Boo certainly did _not_ count; he was more of a _'Tina, if I lost an arm, I wouldn't want a new one unless he agreed to cut his off and personally sew it onto me'_ thing. (That was a thing, Louise insisted. Nobody else had ever agreed.) She even remembered the very incident that had put her non-romantic inclinations in concrete: it had been the day that Andy Pesto had made a move on her.  
  
That day was two years ago at a party held by Tammy Larsen. Her dad was on a business trip, she'd said over the phone, and her mother was... She was somewhere-or-other; Louise hadn't really listened. "They're taking Tammy Time!" her unwanted hostess had enthused. "So, um, you know, Tina's invited, and..." Louise still had her in a proverbial headlock— Tammy had made good on the promise (it had been more like extortion) to invite Tina to all future parties. "You're, like, sixteen now, right?"  
  
"Fourteen."  
  
"Haha! Good enouuuugghhhh!" Tammy rasped in her staticky shriek of a voice that made Louise want to punt her between the legs. "There's gonna be ALCOHOL and BOYS and you better come!"  
  
That was the first night Louise had ever had more than half a cup of wine at the dinner table once a month (Linda called it Special Saturday Night Bonding Time). Tina had disappeared somewhere in the basement after about an hour of exchanging significant glances with Jimmy Jr. Everyone around Louise was kissing.  
  
She lay on the carpet, eyes closed, trying to quell the dizziness that was causing her brain to ricochet from one side of her skull to the other. It was peaceful, for a moment, until Andy Pesto appeared above her, his face filling her vision when she opened her eyes.  
  
"Hey, Louise! Do you wanna make out?" he had asked her brightly. "Everyone else is making out, even Ollie— he's right over there if you want to see him. Wait, who's that girl he's with? Haha, I dunno! Hi, Ollie!"  
  
"Hi, Andy!" came the reply from across the room.  
  
"Hey, Ollie! You— oh, okay, you're kissing that girl again! Never mind! I'll catch up with you as soon as possible!" Andy's face then pressed close to hers. His breath smelled stale. "Well—" he began.  
  
_Do I want to make out,_ Louise thought to herself as she stared up at his unappealing face. She could not think of anything in the world she wanted to do less at that moment, except maybe being doused in gasoline and set on fire, or being forced on a cross-country trip across Canada.  
  
"I'd rather grind off all of my fingertips with a belt sander than kiss you," Louise responded sincerely. The room spun.  
  
That had been the end of that. From that day onward, Louise had told anyone who asked that she was not compatible with anyone relationship-wise. Hell, she had a tough enough time approving friendships; developing anything for anyone beyond platonic tolerance seemed to be downright impossible.  
  
This put her in a stalemate with Jessica, which was completely unfair on the other girl, because she wasn't even aware that Louise was carrying a sort of grudge against her. That had made her less than pleasant to be around lately, and Jessica seemed to becoming more and more aware of that. If her feelings were hurt, however, she was not forthcoming with how she felt... which just made the stalemate even more pointless and counter intuitive.  
  
She was roused from her thoughts by Millie's sing-song voice. "Louise!" Mopsy gave a little bark as Millie made room for herself on Louise's seat, nudging her off to the side with a hip. Louise looked up at her. Today Millie wore her hair in a fluffy bun on top of her head that made her look like a Dr. Seuss character. The sparkly pink eyeshadow she wore only contributed to her cartoonish appearance. In one hand she cradled the caterpillar moth that they had uncovered days ago.  
  
"Break time," Millie said cheerfully. "Do you take requests, Louise?"  
  
Louise tried to shift away, but she couldn't get very far without falling off of the chair entirely. "No," she said. "You can get back to me when I learn how to actually play."  
  
"Ooooh," said Millie sympathetically. "That's too bad. Lou really wanted to hear _You Oughta Know_." She held up the caterpillar moth.  
  
Paling, Louise looked down at the insect and then up into Millie's round face. "You named it after me?" _Gross._  
  
Millie pretended as though she hadn't heard what Louise had said, shifting gears entirely. "Jay-kay," she said. It took Louise a moment to understand that she was pronouncing the Internet abbreviation. "I know you can't play. The real question is what'd Jessica do to piss you off?"  
  
"Um, what?" was all Louise could say, alarmed that Millie had picked up on anything out of the ordinary when it came to herself and Jessica.  
  
Leaning over the keyboard to gently place Lou the caterpillar moth down on one of the keys, Millie flashed a dazzling smile. "Nothing gets past your _bestie_ ," she said. "And by that I mean me. Nothing gets past me."  
  
"Again," said Louise. "You and I. Not friends. Ever. But." She hesitated. "What did you see?" She loathed the idea of reaching out to Millie for insight; it was truly a sign of just how far she'd fallen.  
  
It was a mistake to even bother. "Oh, _Louise!_ " Millie said, laughing warmly. She reached over and squeezed her arm, her eyes sparkling with unrestrained glee over this bit of leverage she now held over Louise. "It's not going to be _that_ easy!"  
  
And then she stood up, scooping Lou back into one hand, leaving Louise hot in the face and seething.

  


•

 

With nine days left of camp, Louise had supposed that she was doing a pretty good job of negotiating her homesickness. It had plagued her mostly at night, right before going to sleep, and in the mornings— times when she felt the most lonely. But it had been pretty manageable for the most part. What brought it out in full force was the day's activity schedule: cooking.  
  
"Burgers," said Jessica, amused. She had spread the schedule out on the table at breakfast. "Is that really something you can get away with teaching little girls?"  
  
"I was already doing it when I was eight," said Louise, and normally she would have said this in a bragging manner, but right now all she could think of was the family restaurant and how badly she missed its familiar sights and smells.  
  
"That's not really something children should aspire to," said Jessica. "I mean, because of the legalities."  
  
Louise wanted to say something about having her father retroactively arrested under child labor laws, but her heart wasn't in it. She just shook her head silently. Jessica sat there, looking somewhat expectant; when Louise failed to parry back, her expression clouded, and she went quiet as well.  
  
Fire pit cooking wasn't exactly something her father had taught her, but the physical labor of digging out the pit and then building it up was satisfying work, and once the fire was lit and the grill placed on top, Louise felt somewhat mournful. The campers hovered around, most of them wistfully wishing for marshmallows and chocolate rather than the container of raw meat that sat nearby. Louise thumbed through her manual listlessly, trying to decide on a good instructional starting point.  
  
_Mom would love this_ , she thought as she stared at the fire pit. Her stomach felt like it had been scooped out.  
  
Jessica was eyeing her with abject concern. Louise cursed herself for being so transparent. She stiffened. "Okay," she said, a little too loudly. "Can I get an assistant? Sydney? June?" She watched the campers shrink back, none of them wanting to get too close to the raw meat or to the fire.  
  
"I volunteer," said Jessica tentatively.  
  
Louise hesitated before deciding that she had to suck up whatever it was that had her feeling so weird. "Okay, Raw Dough," she said. When the campers stared in confusion, she amended, somewhat awkwardly: "Jessica. Come here."  
  
Ten minutes later, they were working over the grill together as Louise explained as patiently as she could just what she was doing and why. The protective gloves that had been given to the campers were so huge and oversized that they rode straight up to their elbows, and it made it difficult for the children to grip the tongs at all. Louise wound up doing the majority of the work.  
  
But her mind was still on the restaurant and on her family. She wondered what they were doing right then. The restaurant would be open at this time of day, and summer was always their busy season— well, what passed for busy at Bob's Burgers, anyway. Her father was probably losing even more hair without Louise around to run the till and finagle larger tips. Her mother had likely already broken the padlock on her bedroom door and was redecorating the entire thing, something Louise thought she might not even mind at this point. They would all be working twice as hard without her. For a moment, Louise could not believe that she had ever wanted to leave in the first place, and she suddenly felt bitterly selfish and remorseful. If she had just stayed — if she'd never answered that help wanted advertisement in the newspaper — she wouldn't be feeling this way. She would never have met Jessica again, either, which would have saved her a whole lot of confusion and heartache.  
  
A voice interrupted her thoughts— the voice of the last person currently occupying them. "You okay?"  
  
Louise lowered the tongs and looked up at Jessica, who stood behind her shoulder. Jessica was frowning at her slightly, her sharp eyes creased by the furrow of her brow. Louise's throat tightened.  
  
_How unfair,_ she thought. Jessica had shut her out several days ago when she'd reached out to her, brushing away her admittedly awkward attempts to connect. Now she was returning the favor, and Louise was even less inclined to cooperate.  
  
"I'm fine," she said stiffly, prying another burger off of the grill and placing it onto a plate held in Georgia's waiting hands. The children shuffled around brandishing bottles of condiments, howling occasionally when mustard wound up on a shirt.  
  
"You just seem sort of..." Jessica trailed off. She shifted, folding her arms across her chest in a pose that looked unusually vulnerable on her. "I don't know. Out of it lately."  
  
"Amazing," said Louise dryly, sarcasm coming faster to her than anything else. "You're really observant."  
  
Jessica's arms tightened over her chest. She slanted an eyebrow at Louise, looking startled. "Okay," she said. "That's fair. I don't know what I did to deserve that, but that's fair."  
  
Immediately she felt like the worst person alive standing before a person that she really did genuinely like. Feeling nauseous and angry with herself, Louise put the tongs down. "I didn't mean that," she said weakly. "Sometimes things just come outta my mouth—"  
  
"Yeah," said Jessica. "That seems to happen a lot with you." Her tone was just flat and measured enough for Louise to read it as detached, and she backed away from the grill, sirens winding up loudly in her mind. She could not stand the stifling atmosphere for even one more minute.  
  
"Excuse me," she said. "Can you take over? I'll be back soon."  
  
Before Jessica could answer, Louise was turning to go, rushing off so quickly that her bunny ears nearly flew off of her head.

  


•

 

Mopsy was hanging around outside of the staff building when she got there. He lumbered to his feet and began huffing happily at the sight of her. Although she was stewing in her own regret and anger, Louise paused long enough to kneel and pet him, leaning down to bury her face in the soft fur of his neck.  
  
"Miss Belcher?"  
  
Louise turned slightly, her arms still wrapped around the dog, to look up at Ginny, who stood there with an expression of surprise and consternation. Normally, she might have been slightly dismayed to see her, but Ginny was exactly who she was looking for right now. "Hey," said Louise reluctantly, letting go of Mopsy and hauling herself to her feet. "Um." She realized that she had no idea how to word her request.  
  
Ginny, however, seemed to understand somehow. For all of her neuroses, she seemed to perceive something important now. "Is there something I can help you with?" she asked, her expression creasing in a puzzled manner.  
  
"I know it's only for emergencies, really," said Louise, feeling somewhat ashamed. There was a hard lump in her throat that made it even more difficult to force out what she had to say. How humiliating. She resolved to have herself lobotomized the moment she got home: surely it would take care of this sort of weakness along with every other embarrassment she'd suffered since arriving at this prison of a camp. "But I was wondering if I could place a phone call. Not a long one. I just want to talk to my Mom."  
  
She fully expected Ginny to say no. After all, the camp director was not subtle with her general wariness towards her, and Louise knew well that she hadn't exactly been a top priority in the hiring process. But Ginny proceeded to surprise her. "Of course, Louise," she said, and Louise did not miss out on the significance of _Louise_ instead of _Miss Belcher_.  
  
"Thank you," she said, stunned, unable to come up with anything else. She and Mopsy followed Ginny inside of the staff building. Ginny retrieved her keys from a pocket and unlocked her office, holding the door open.  
  
"Is ten minutes alright?" she asked.  
  
"Yeah," said Louise, still shocked that Ginny was permitting this at all.  
  
"You have to dial 9 first to call out," said Ginny. "I'll be back soon." She whistled down at Mopsy, who turned in two and half a circles before bounding off with her as she shut the door.  
  
Louise found herself alone in Ginny's office once more, and now she felt bad for the instances she'd sneaked in before. Rather than take advantage once more of the ability to access camp files, she sank down into Ginny's comfortable chair and pulled the phone across the desk. She pressed 9 and then punched in the number for the restaurant, her hands feeling weak and shaky.  
  
"Bob's Burgers!" answered her mother on the other end of the line. Louise had never heard a sound more comforting.  
  
"Mom," she said, clearing her throat to force the knot out of it. "Hey."  
  
"Oh!" Linda gasped. "Louise! Hi, honey!" There was a rustling sound, and her voice became a little quieter as she shouted, presumably towards the kitchen, "Bobby, it's Louise!" Then her voice came back strong into the receiver. "What are you doin' calling us outta nowhere?"  
  
"Um, it's nothing." Louise's chest was already swelling with comfort and familiarity. She crossed her legs tightly beneath the desk.  
  
"You hurt? You get a fish hook to the eye? You got poison ivy on your butt?" Linda suddenly sounded deeply concerned. "Do I gotta come get ya?"  
  
"No!" Louise yelped. "No, Mom." Relief flooded through her as sweet and pure as spring water. She felt better already just listening to her mother's voice. "I just, uh. I wanted to talk to you."  
  
"That's great!" bubbled Linda happily. "Oh, this is a riot. It's like how it's gonna be ten years from now, when you're livin' on your own and you only call back to talk to your poor parents occasionally. You know, when our entire relationship'll be based on that one phone call you'll toss at us once a month."  
  
"Stop! It's never going to be like that," said Louise, but she was grinning.  
  
"Well," said Linda. "How are you likin' it? Are you itching to come home?"  
  
Louise debated how truthful she should be, reanalyzing why she'd called her mother to begin with. In the end, honesty won out for once in her life. "Sort of," she mumbled. "We've been... really busy. I just started thinking of you guys a lot today."  
  
"Aw, sweetheart," said Linda soothingly. "You got, what, eight days? Nine? You'll be home right away. Thank _god_ , too. You hear about the heart attack your freakin' brother gave us?"  
  
"Uh... I take it Gene dropped the sabbatical bomb on you."  
  
"I can't believe it!" groaned Linda. "Your father's a mess over it. I think he might be dying."  
  
"It's important to Gene," said Louise, although whenever she thought of her brother leaving and how soon it would be, she felt a little lost, too. "I think he was always meant to do that kind of thing."  
  
"What? Wander Asia learning new yoga techniques?"  
  
"Sure," said Louise. "Sure, Mom. That sounds pretty safe for work and family-friendly enough for you and Dad to digest."  
  
"Don't you get started," admonished Linda. "Your brother's a very safe gal."  
  
"Stop," said Louise with slowly growing horror, not wanting to get into the specifics.  
  
"So then tell me about camp," Linda pressed.  
  
Louise thought it over. "It's fine. I mean, aside from Millie. And the fact that I'm really not ever going to be great with kids, but I wasn't riding any hopes on that one."  
  
"Millie Frock's a nice girl," said Linda. "You just try to be good with her, Louise."  
  
Despite her best efforts, Linda had never fully understood the grudge Louise stubbornly held against Millie. She decided that, given her limited time on the phone, today was not the day to rehash her argument. Instead she said, "Uh, and my co-counselor. Jessica."  
  
"Oh, right," said Linda keenly. "Tina and Gene mentioned you were in a cabin with your little slumber party pal! I remember her. She was real good for you, Louise. It was so sad when she moved away! I tried so hard to find you a friend, and I found you one, and she just up and leaves! Go figure."  
  
" _Uggghhhh_ ," groaned Louise, embarrassed.  
  
"Maybe she can come visit you when your little camp thing is over," said Linda hopefully. She was always ready to encourage anything that hinted towards Louise developing a social life that extended outside of Tina, Gene, and occasionally Rudy Steiblitz.  
  
Oh, shit. Jessica visiting? Louise hadn't even considered it before. She'd been so wound up in the thought that Jessica would be heading back up to Wellington; everything outside of her hometown seemed as though it might as well be as far away as the moon, really. "I don't know," she said, feeling strangely anxious about the idea. "I mean, I don't even know if we're, uh, friends."  
  
"You're not gettin' along?" Linda sounded disappointed.  
  
"Sort of," Louise muttered. "I'm not sure. Being around her kind of bums me out." That wasn't really the truth, not entirely, but she had no other way to word what she'd been feeling lately, and she certainly wasn't about to say anything along the lines of _I'm kind of scared because I'm not used to what's going on in my head._  
  
Linda zeroed right in on Louise's insecurity. "If you wanna cry, baby, it's fine. You go on and cry! Mommy's listening."  
  
"I don't want to cry at you!" Louise sputtered. "Mom, I'm almost seventeen!"  
  
"You're never too old to cry to your mama. Gene was crying to me just yesterday. He lost an auction on eBay." Linda sighed. In the background, Louise could hear the register chime. "Look, you just keep your chin up, okay? Sometimes people don't mesh right. Sometimes you meet a Ginger, and sometimes you don't. You just make the best of it, okay? You're my bright-eyed, bushy-tailed lil' bunny."  
  
It was, at best, vague and cheesy advice, but it was somehow exactly what Louise needed to hear. She gnawed on her lower lip, wishing she could hug her mother at that moment. "Thanks, Mom," she said softly. Ginny appeared in the doorway; apparently her ten minutes were up. Louise was fine with that. "I gotta go now."  
  
"Well, it was great to hear from you, baby!" said Linda warmly. "You write us another letter, okay?"  
  
"Okay," said Louise. Although Ginny was standing right there and it made her feel embarrassed to say it, she said, "I love you. Tell Dad that, too."  
  
"You got it, Louise," said Linda. "We love you, too. We'll see you in a week."  
  
Louise hung up the phone and stood from the desk, looking at Ginny. "Thanks," she said gratefully, and she truly meant it.  
  
"Of course, Miss Belcher," said Ginny. "You might find it hard to believe, but I care about your welfare." And then she smiled, moving aside to let Louise back out through the door.  
  
Louise believed her. "I know," she said. "Second-favorite boss I've ever had, Ginny."  
  
She later decided that Ginny was pretty cool for not mentioning the obvious: that Louise had only called two people 'boss' before in her life.

  


•

 

It was midnight when someone crawled into Louise's bed.  
  
Louise screamed, or she tried to. The person had sealed a hand over her mouth. She thrashed wildly, hands clawing out at her unseen attacker before she tried to reach for the switchblade under her pillow, her heart pounding so hard she thought she was about to go into cardiac arrest, thinking that it was true, that serial killers _did_ attack sleepaway camps, and this was it, she would die here in a bunk bed in _Twinkle Cabin_ of all damn places, she would die _right there_ without ever having seen her first million dollars—  
  
"Shhhh!" Millie said, and she took her hand away.  
  
"Millie!" screamed Louise, and she was silenced by a hand again. This time she fought even harder, deciding that having Millie in her bed was even worse than having a serial killer in it.  
  
The commotion had woken Jessica, who in a matter of seconds had bounded down the bunk bed ladder and was dragging Millie off of her. In the pale moonlight Jessica looked completely alert and ready to go despite the fact that she had surely been asleep just moments ago. She stood there with her arms locked under Millie's, dressed in no more than a thin camisole and cotton shorts. Louise sucked in a few ragged breaths, falling back against her bed and reaching up to make sure that her hat had not gone askew in the struggle.  
  
" _Jessica_ ," she gasped, too relieved and too dizzy with adrenaline to come up with any kind of nickname for her.  
  
"How did you get in here?" Jessica demanded to know in a low, harsh whisper, shaking Millie. In the next room over, Louise could hear the campers stir. "The door was locked!"  
  
Millie was giggling to herself. Louise decided that she had never seen her look more insane. "You're not the only one who can pick locks," she said. "The window was super loose." Indeed, the window was wide open, and the warm night breeze was rolling in.  
  
Jessica let go of Millie, who straightened, dusting herself off. Louise saw that she was perfectly coiffed and dressed in jean shorts and a bikini top. Over her shoulder was a bag. Louise took a few long breaths, and then she carefully drew the switchblade out from under her pillow.  
  
"I'm going to hack that stupid ponytail right off your head if you don't explain right now what the hell you're planning, Millie," said Louise, in no mood to fool around.  
  
Millie rolled her eyes, utterly unintimidated. "It's like the two of you have never been to camp before. Remember? We're sneaking out after curfew. _Duh_? Silly lil' billy goats!" She began laughing her humming, stuttering laugh, the one that always raised Louise's hackles. If Louise were an exotic animal, she might have started flashing her warning colors at that moment.  
  
"No, we're not," said Jessica, and Louise was in full and utter agreement in spite of the fact that she had little to harmonize with Jessica lately. "Go away. Right now. Bye." She moved to the still-open window and held her hands up to it like a game show hostess showing off a prize.  
  
"Let's go, let's go, let's go," said Millie, unbothered. "Vicky's waiting outside. Did I mention there's a cash incentive?"  
  
Millie had accessed her detonator and pressed the button with one firm finger. Louise tucked the switchblade away, willing herself patience as she said slowly, "Explain."  
  
"Lightning Cabin needs a drop-off," said Millie, and she reached into the bag at her shoulder. She pulled out four ten dollar bills and a wad of paper. "I took a pre-order earlier. Cash up front. Clever, right? We just hide the snacks in the bush next to their cabin." She seemed to be utterly proud of herself, standing there with all of the guileless innocence of a puppy expecting praise.  
  
"That's," said Louise blankly. "Uh." She didn't want to say _Good job_ , but money was money, and she had sacrificed her pride for fewer dollars before.  
  
Jessica knelt and pulled the stash box out from underneath Louise's bed. "Fine," she said. "Since we're partnered, and I'm not a scam artist."  
  
_I am_ , thought Louise, begrudgingly admiring Jessica's devotion to fairness.  
  
"Get your swimsuits," Millie reminded the two of them. "The pool's open, and there's nothing like a night swim."  
  
Part of Louise thought that the idea sounded pretty fun. She was all for breaking the rules and sneaking out— just not with Millie. Maybe, she thought idly, if it were just herself and Jessica. Shit.  
  
It was Jessica who grounded the both of them. "If we get caught, we'll all lose your jobs," she said. "How'd you convince Soon-Mi to even go along with this?"  
  
"Vicky's _obviously_ completely terrified of her," said Louise, "because Millie's probably holding her entire family hostage."  
  
"Vicky _wants_ to!" said Millie brightly. "Come on, it'll just be an hour. A fun hour, just us besties!"  
  
Louise dragged her boots out from under the bed and was already lacing them up. "When are you ever going to go back to your home planet, Millie?" she demanded to know. "You know, Backwards Land where all the dirty lies you keep telling yourself are true?"  
  
"It was going to be a bonfire," said Millie out loud, looking thoughtful, "but Vicky told me she was allergic to smoke."  
  
Whether that was true or not, Louise was thankful for the excuse. She wasn't sure if Millie could be trusted to maintain anything involving fire. Nearby, Jessica was pulling her swimsuit out of one of the drawers; apparently she had decided, like Louise had concluded, that tolerating this insane idea for one hour was better than the potential consequences of turning Millie down. Without a word she moved towards the bathroom, presumably to change. Louise watched her go before turning back to Millie, blinking several times so that her eyes would not start their telltale twitching.  
  
"Great," she said finally, the word rolling out of her in an exasperated sigh. She got to her feet to look for her swimsuit.

  


•

 

After they had made the drop at Lightning Cabin, Millie led the way towards the recreational hall. It was strange to be walking the campgrounds so late at night; the emptiness and the silence under the inky sky creeped Louise out a little bit. She was so used to seeing these places filled with staff and blue-shirted Thundergirls that the campgrounds seemed nearly unrecognizable, like a new place entirely that she'd never seen before. It made her feel strangely lonely, and the thought of an impending hour with Millie was not helping matters. Louise recalled Millie's words about the pool being open before she realized the inconsistency within them. How?  
  
Her question was answered just as soon as they got there: somehow, Millie had obtained a key for the recreational hall. As soon as she produced it, Jessica was holding her hand out for it before Louise could even voice a question. "Let me see that," she said.  
  
"Why?" Millie said sweetly, holding it away, but her short arms were no match for Jessica's long reach. She relinquished the key without a struggle.  
  
Jessica inspected it closely. "So who'd you steal this from?"  
  
"No one!" Millie chirped, her eyes widening. "Is it so hard to believe that Ginny trusts me? It's so that I can put in extra time working on the Penny-Anne costumes."  
  
"So basically she shouldn't have trusted you," said Louise, "because you're not doing what you said you would. Because you can't be trusted. With anything. For any reason." She found it impossible to bite her tongue on the matter, even though she knew full well that she would be doing exactly what Millie was doing if their positions were reversed. They technically weren't breaking any rules.  
  
"I _can_ be trusted," said Millie in a voice that was suddenly very serious. "Jeez, Louise — haha — you've been in a pretty bad mood lately!" She unlocked the double doors to the recreational hall and shouldered them open as Louise fumed. It was true, but she felt especially affronted that Millie was pointing that out with Jessica standing right there. She told herself not to look up and not to look for anything significant in her co-counselor's expression.  
  
"What if there's an alarm?" Vicky asked softly. She had hardly spoken during the walk over, constantly peering over her shoulder and spooking at noises only she seemed to be able to hear. Her hair was pulled back into a tight ponytail that made her face look even more drawn and worried than usual.  
  
"Then we get to go on a run," said Jessica in a dry voice that Louise thought she intended to sound reassuring.  
  
But Vicky's concerns were unfounded; the recreational hall was just as silent as the campgrounds. It was dark and lit only by the pool lights, which shone even through the glass wall that separated the pool from the other rooms in the hall. Millie tossed her arms up in the air excitedly and pushed open the door to the pool. The scent of chlorine rolled out first, followed by the muggy humidity of the pool. Louise began to feel stuffy already.  
  
Millie had already run across the tiles towards the lockers and changing room with Vicky at her side, crooning something about how she was going to show off her swan dive. Louise did not follow, thankful for the silence once Millie and Vicky had disappeared into the changing room. That left her standing there by the edge of the pool, staring down into the gently lapping water. She almost forgot for a moment that there was a fourth person with them, but it was impossible to truly forget Jessica. Louise looked around for her.  
  
Jessica had walked over to the shower station to set her bag down, and now she reached to remove her shirt. For a moment, Louise stood there, staring at her. She could see the outline of Jessica's ribcage through the fabric of her one-piece swimsuit as she lifted her shirt up over her head. Against the blue light emitting from the pool, Jessica's pale skin glowed, her long legs throwing slender shadows onto the wall behind her. She had already turned to adjust the knob of the shower before Louise realized that Jessica was looking at her and had seen her staring.  
  
Louise's face immediately began to burn hot. She hadn't really meant to stare. It had just happened. "When—" she began, trying to think of a way to smooth the moment over, "when you're done with that— um—"  
  
"Here. There's lots of room." Jessica's voice had a distinctly careful edge to it as she took a step to the side under the spray, motioning the flat of her hand to the grate beneath her feet. The shower station was little more than a spigot in the wall and a drain in the floor, and there was only one. Jessica was vaguely motioning her over.  
  
_Oh,_ thought Louise. Girls did that, right? They did that sort of thing? She wasn't sure. She'd never had any close female friends. She knew that Tina and her friends sometimes did bizarre things like use the same changing room stalls at clothing stores, or share a little bit _too_ much detail about their romantic lives with one another in a way that made Louise extremely uncomfortable to overhear. This wasn't much in comparison, right? She rocked on her heels and stared down at her boots before she decided that, no, she wouldn't be doing anything wrong by standing next to Jessica at the shower station. She knelt to undo the laces on her boots, and once she had the rest of her clothes off she stepped towards the shower.  
  
Water was running down Jessica's body, turning the blue of her swimsuit to navy. Louise found herself staring again for just a moment before she directed her eyes down to the drain. Jessica reached up and tilted the spigot off-center slightly so that Louise could have access to it. The water nearly hit her in the face; apparently Jessica had not adjusted for height. Louise jerked her head back, coughing and reaching up to check the status of her hat.  
  
"You're going to get my ears wet!" she yelped before she could bite back the words, but they were sufficient enough to break the awkward silence.  
  
Jessica had started to laugh. "Sorry," she said. "You could just take them off."  
  
"No," Louise heaved. "I'm winning that bet."  
  
Turning her head up towards the spigot, Jessica tipped her chin back and let the water run over her hair. She reached up to push her fingers through it to get it out of her eyes. "I was hoping you'd forgotten it. I'm starting to think I'm going to lose."  
  
"I told you it would never happen," said Louise, shaking her head. "It wasn't even worth trying."  
  
"Yeah," said Jessica, but she didn't sound disappointed or angry, just thoughtful. There was a contemplative look on her face as they lapsed into silence again. The only sound Louise could hear was the water rushing down upon them both. She moved her hands beneath it and let it pour onto her stomach. After a moment, Jessica spoke again. "Can we talk about earlier today? Yes or no?"  
  
Louise knew exactly what she was referring to, but she hesitated anyway. "About what?" she muttered.  
  
"You kind of ran off," said Jessica. She took a small step closer. Louise forced herself to look up and meet her eyes. Jessica was already staring right at her. "I don't know. I think it was because I was kind of digging at you. I wanted to say sorry. But—" She stopped.  
  
"But?" Louise echoed.  
  
"But I meant it," said Jessica. "You seem out of it lately. And if it pisses you off that I've noticed, then..."  
  
Louise stiffened. She had reacted badly when Jessica had pointed it out before; that was very much true. She felt kind of like shit about it now. But how could she expect Jessica to understand when she could not even explain it to _herself_? How could she confess to something she was not even entirely sure of? All Louise really knew at that moment — the only concrete thing she had to rely on — was the fact that part of her was happy, in a way that made her feel slightly guilty, to be standing so close to Jessica like this. Shit, even just being around Jessica had made her feel like that lately. But the rest of her — and it was a large part — just felt frustrated and anxious and dizzy and confused.  
  
"I guess I owe you an apology, too," she said quietly. "Look, I don't really, uh, do this thing. With the making friends? And stuff?" Her voice lilted off into question marks, betraying her uncertainty.  
  
"Is that what it is?" Jessica asked in a tone that Louise could discern no identifiable emotion from. It made her freeze up again, unsure of what Jessica actually meant.  
  
"Uh, yeah," mumbled Louise, the small amount of bravado she had managed to wager fading away.  
  
"Come on, Louise." Jessica reached to shut off the shower, dripping water as she stepped away from it and across the tiles to the edge of the pool. Louise stood shivering with cold as she watched her lower herself into the water before she realized that she had been encouraged to follow. She moved to the other end of the pool, where the stairs were; she wasn't interested in dunking her head or her hat in.  
  
She sunk slowly into the water. Lit up by the bluish lights, it was surprisingly warm against her skin, or at least it was compared to the temperature of the building. She wrapped a hand against the rail and leaned into it, sitting against the step. Jessica floated near the center of the pool; seeing Louise enter, she submerged herself and swam over to the shallow end where Louise sat. She resurfaced right in front of her, pulling herself onto the steps next to her.  
  
"So you don't want to talk about it," said Jessica down at the water.  
  
Louise's heart was thudding so hard she felt nauseous. "About what?" she said. Half of her hoped that Jessica understood what was going on, but the other half fervently hoped she didn't. The frustration gave way to a sort of fury that twisted her stomach into knots. The feeling was utterly unmanageable; at this rate, Louise was not sure if she was going to be able to make it another week at camp feeling this way.  
  
Jessica's sharp chin jutted forward slightly as she pinched her tongue between her teeth, seeming to think it over. "There's something going on here. With you and me. Right?"  
  
Oh, god.  
  
_That could mean a million different things,_ Louise thought to herself immediately. _She could mean anything. She could definitely mean anything._  
  
But she wanted Jessica to mean one thing in particular. She was shocked to realize that she was hoping for it.  
  
"I," she started, realizing that she was shivering slightly. It wasn't cold in the pool. "I don't know if—"  
  
"AND NOW," cut Millie's shrieking voice through the calm air, "everyone please watch my swan dive!"  
  
Louise, startled, white-knuckled the railing. Millie and Vicky had reappeared out of nowhere. The shock that rolled through her struck her numb and wordless; Jessica at least looked equally startled as she looked at Millie standing over by the deep end of the pool.  
  
The ensuing dive caused a ripple that spread all the way from the far end to the pool to where Louise and Jessica were sitting, making the water slosh up and around their waists and effectively putting an abrupt end to the beginning of a conversation that Louise realized she had been desperate to have.

  


•

 

An hour later Millie had checked the time and ushered everyone out of the pool, swearing up and down that she was a woman of her word. They put the towels back where they had found them, made sure the changing room was clean, and locked up the recreational hall. When they stepped back outside, they found that it was raining. It wasn't a heavy pour, just a light, warm spray, but it made Vicky squeal with displeasure and had quickly turned the ground to mud.  
  
"We'll see you tomorrow!" Millie said gleefully; apparently the weather did not deter her. She raised her bag above her head like a shield against the rain and headed out into it back towards her cabin with Vicky.  
  
That left Louise standing with Jessica under the awning. She certainly hadn't been prepared for rain, and after all the effort she had put into keeping her hat dry, she wasn't happy. Jessica sighed beside her, looking out into the mist. The moonlight colored it a milky shade, illuminating it with a brilliance that was dazzling, in a way, but it made it impossible to see through it.  
  
"Do you remember the way back?" Louise wondered aloud.  
  
"I think so," said Jessica, and then in that moment she reached down and clasped Louise's hand to tug her out from under the awning. Her hand was warm and her grip strong, and Louise found herself feeling warm again as she tried to keep pace with her. Jessica moved forward in the rain with her head slightly bowed against it; there was something striking about her face lit up by the moonlight. Louise looked at her as they rushed through it, tearing her eyes away only when she stumbled on the uneven ground.  
  
In the distance, there was a bright flash of light that filled the sky and pierced through the clouds, followed by a low, resounding roll of thunder. Jessica increased her pace.  
  
"Shouldn't we try to get out of this as soon as possible?" panted Louise, forced to raise her voice through the noise. Another flash burst in the sky as soon as she'd finished her question, and the thunder that followed sounded a lot closer.  
  
Jessica's hand tightened on hers. Apparently this was all the response Jessica had to offer, but right after that she changed directions slightly. Louise realized that they were heading towards the tennis court, which was fairly close. It soon emerged from the mist, looking eerily abandoned in the darkness and rain. Nearby was a small storage shed that was never locked; Jessica picked up the pace, and by the time they reached it they had been half-jogging and Louise was slightly out of breath. Jessica let go of her hand and pushed the doors open.  
  
The inside of the storage shed smelled of the rubber and wood of sports equipment, but it was insulated and held neatly against the rain. Jessica propped the door open with a tennis racquet and shook the rainwater out of her hair as Louise caught her breath. Another flash of lightning exploded outside. Jessica stood by the door staring resolutely out into the rain, looking slightly worried. Louise guessed what the issue might have been.  
  
"It'll wake them up," she said, staring at Jessica's back. "The thunder. It's going to wake the kids up, right? And then they'll see that we're not in there and freak out, probably." She groaned. They might wind up losing their jobs anyway.  
  
"Yeah," murmured Jessica. Then her shoulders slumped slightly. "Well, if you want to stay here and wait it out, I can go ahead."  
  
"What?" Louise snapped to full attention and lowered her hands from where she had been squeezing the water out of her rabbit ears, alarmed. "Don't— don't do that."  
  
Jessica glanced at her sideways. "I'm not going to get hit by lightning," she said. "The chances are pretty low."  
  
"Don't leave me here alone," Louise burst out before she could stop herself.  
  
There was a pause. "Right," said Jessica softly. "Sorry."  
  
They stood there for several moments, just staring at one another. Louise had experienced many awkward moments with Jessica so far, and she recalled feeling like she had never felt more out of place before in her entire life when she'd been sitting on Jessica's bed with her talking about how they'd miss one another. But that moment was nothing compared to this one. This was beyond her mere human limits of endurance. Louise sort of felt like punching herself in the face, but mostly she ached to reach out and strike Jessica instead, to childishly slap her and then run off like a playground bully to avoid all of her problems and the potential of confrontation.  
  
It was Jessica that spoke first. "I guess now would be a good time to talk, wouldn't it."  
  
Right. They had been interrupted by Millie back at the pool. Jessica had touched upon a subject that Louise had been trying very hard to ignore. She felt her throat go completely dry as they stared at one another. There was only the sound of water dripping off of their clothes to the floor and the muffled sound of thunder outside. Louise balled her hands up at her sides.  
  
She didn't want to talk about it. But she did. But she _didn't_.  
  
Louise didn't know what she wanted in that moment, and it was because of that that stubbornness won out.  
  
"There's nothing to talk about," she said, bitterly resenting herself for the walls she had built around her defenses, the ones she couldn't lower even when she _wanted_ to.  
  
She expected the conversation to end there, for Jessica to just nod and turn stone faced again, but she should have known better. Jessica was anything but predictable.  
  
"You're lying," she said, and she moved away from the door and towards Louise, trailing water. The window at Louise's back lit her face up; her eyes were hard. She stopped only when she was a pace from Louise— close enough to touch.  
  
Anger ran hotly through her, anger that Jessica had seen right through her, that she was challenging her, that she was staring her down defying her to tell the truth, and that was all it took to bring Louise's frustrations to a boiling point. The fury spilled out of her then, choking her throat up and making it hard to think.  
  
"Shut up!" she raged. "Shut _up!_ You don't know the first thing _about_ me, you don't know _anything_ — you think you can just—"  
  
But she couldn't think of anything to say. Nothing to excuse away what she felt in her head, in her heart. Instead Louise drew her hand back and whipped it forward towards Jessica's face.  
  
It never connected.  
  
Jessica's fingers locked around her wrist and held it tightly before she threw her weight into pushing it away. Louise stumbled after missing, nearly colliding with the bin of basketballs behind her, her vision red. In front of her, Jessica was all tension and clenched fists held at her sides. "Why'd you just try to hit me?" Jessica demanded to know in a voice as sharp as a knife. The tone was completely unfamiliar on her, something Louise had never heard before, and it made her uneasy.  
  
But her thoughts weren't flowing coherently, and she could do little but glare at her, snarling, baring her teeth like an animal. "I don't _know_!" she screamed. That, at least, felt like it wasn't a lie.  
  
However, the truth was that she _did_ know, and although Louise had lived her life telling herself that she always thought things through completely before deciding to press forward with them, her hair-trigger impulsivity won out more often than not and got her into the sort of trouble that had put her in this situation in the first place. There was nothing she could think of to do.  
  
Except for one thing.  
  
Louise took a step forward, reached up to grasp at Jessica's shoulders, and pressed her mouth to hers.  
  
Their lips collided bruisingly. Louise had never really _kissed_ someone before— nor had anyone ever kissed her. If she were a more sentimental person, she might have been a little mortified that this was her first kiss, nearly seventeen and with a girl she'd just tried to slap in the face, a girl who had every right to be furious with her. But Louise had never attached value to the idea of that 'first' meaning anything. It hadn't been anything real to her. Until now.  
  
Her lips were a mess, completely unsure of what she was doing. Jessica seemed not to know what to do, either, because she wasn't moving. She was completely still. She was—  
  
Louise pulled away abruptly. At first, she was satisfied to find Jessica looking startled. Her sharp cheekbones were pale. Her eyes looked once into Louise's, and then at the ground. She was expressionless. It was then that Louise's satisfaction began to drain away and humiliation welled up in her chest, swift and hot and utterly horrifying. It sent her reeling. She moved back, feeling lightheaded.  
  
_Shit. What the hell did I just do?_  
  
"I—" she said, wanting to make up an excuse or explanation, because she knew that she had to look completely fucking insane to Jessica, that she was coming off as someone wildly inconsistent and irrational, but before she could finish the thought, Jessica had reached out for her and was cupping her face in both hands to kiss her hard.  
  
It was Louise's turn to freeze, but she thawed within the same moment, reaching out to tangle her fingers in the thick weave of Jessica's sweater. She could feel her breathing. It was loud, through her nose, and felt hot on her face. It made her skin prickly all over, but it wasn't an unpleasant feeling at all. It thrilled through her as searing fast as the lightning outside, setting her ablaze. Louise wanted more. She wanted to put her arms around Jessica and press close to her body. She wanted to shake her until every inscrutable secret came rattling out. She wanted a lot of things from Jessica in that moment. At least she was getting the one she wanted most now, their mouths moving together with gradually increasing certainty. Jessica was kissing her. Jessica _wanted_ to kiss her. When they pulled apart, Louise yanked on her sweater hard.  
  
" _Idiot,_ " she choked. "Bland, _boring_ idiot."  
  
"I didn't mean to freak you out," said Jessica. "I just—"  
  
Louise cut her off. She didn't want an apology; Jessica didn't owe her one. "Stop—" she said, her voice hitching. "Stop, or I really will hit you, and I won't miss this time."  
  
Jessica stopped. She didn't even seem to be breathing. Louise stared up at her. She thought she could count every little mark on her face. This time she didn't make excuses in her head for what she wanted.  
  
"Kiss me again," said Louise.  
  
Jessica laughed, but it caught in her throat and cracked. This time, her lips felt softer, her arms closing carefully around Louise's waist as their mouths rejoined. Outside, the rain slowed to a stop. A stifling silence had cloaked the shed by the time they pulled apart, unable to meet one another's gaze, and they seemed to wordlessly agree that it was time to get back to the cabin and sleep on what had just happened.  
  
Louise's heart was still racing by the time they made it back to their cabin; her every step felt strange and floating, and it seemed like something in her world had shifted. They hadn't said a thing to one another on the way back, nor while they sneaked quietly back inside to dry off and get dressed for bed. Fortunately, the campers had slept through the thunder, and they were soundly unaware as Louise and Jessica moved quietly in their quarters.  
  
"Hey, Jessica," murmured Louise as Jessica turned to climb the ladder up to her bed, the first thing she had said since that last kiss in the shed. The other girl turned to look at her. Louise felt like they had made a pact, somehow. Negotiated a secret. "Good night," she said, feeling awkward but pleased with herself for making the effort.  
  
Jessica gave a little smile. "I could get used to you calling me by my actual name."  
  
Louise grinned. Things had tentatively begun to feel normal again. Like the tension that had built up between them had shattered, and she might be able to go back to her usual dynamic with Jessica. "Don't," she said.  
  
"Better not," Jessica agreed, and then she was lifting a hand to gently touch Louise on the forearm before she hauled herself onto the ladder. "Good night, Louise."  
  
It was a while before Louise could fall asleep; she spent the passing minutes staring at the bed positioned right on top of hers, thinking about the girl resting above.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments, critique, questions— all are encouraged and appreciated.


End file.
